When walking past the Tempe Sun Devil Fitness Complex on a weekday, students often pass clusters of tents filled with racks of clothes. The little shops take up areas of the sidewalk and intramural fields, creating a hub of activity.
Following a larger trend in the fashion industry, vintage pop-up shops such as those on campus allow students to reuse clothing items and prevent waste. For the past few years, University Street Market has coordinated vendors, times and locations for pop-ups. Emily Watson, a sophomore studying electrical engineering, is the social media marketer for University Street Market.
"They've become popular because (of) social media and just other people showing everyone how you don't have to have the newest thing to be stylish or to fit in," Watson said.
Now in its first year as an official ASU club, University Street Market reaches out to a variety of retailers through social media to participate in pop-ups on all four campuses.
"There's so many unused clothes, or there's so much overconsumption, especially now, and there is another option to that," Watson said. "You can still be stylish, and you can still have style without just going to a fast fashion brand, like Zara or buying off Shein."
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For college students on a budget, the low prices of fast fashion brands can influence their style choices. To combat this, University Street Market strives to keep its prices accessible to its customers.
"Most of the stuff at our markets are under $20 and I feel like that's a reasonable price," Watson said. "A lot of people might say, 'Oh, it's used or whatever, or it's second hand, so it's just older.' But the thing is, older clothes, most of the time, are made better."
Currently, the club has about 15 members who help organize as well as set up and tear down after every event. Trevor Harrison owns and operates Friar Fits, one of the vendors featured in University Street Market's pop-ups.
"It's a great community. I feel like everyone here is super friendly and they love clothes," Harrison said. "I feel like everyone's pretty fashionable."
Most pop-ups, including Friar Fits, feature used clothing, including old jerseys, jeans, jackets and more.
"The stuff we do is all older, so it's high quality, it's rare to find, and it brings some uniqueness, I guess you could say, to each piece of clothing," Harrison said.
Some vendors are run by ASU students, who are not required to pay a booth fee, while others like Friar Fits and Shop Rose 5 are brought on campus through social media. The mixture of vendors allows University Street Market to include a variety of different clothing styles for students to choose from.
"We have a little bit of everything. So any aesthetic, any style you like, we have it in our booth," said Alia Hranek, owner of Shop Rose 5.
The on-campus pop-up revolution gives students the opportunity to shop in between classes, support local businesses and limit the amount of low-quality clothing they purchase.
"4 billion pieces of clothing, or fabric (are) made every single year and (the) majority of it goes into the trash," Hranek said. "Older pieces just are better material, so they don't need to be thrown away."
Edited by Andrew Dirst, Abigail Beck and Natalia Jarrett.
Reach the reporter at allipper@asu.edu and follow @lippert_audrey on X.
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Audrey is a sophomore studying journalism and mass communication with a minor in Spanish. This is her first semester with The State Press. She has also worked at Blaze Radio.
