Marjorie Lacombe ’13 is a gifted artist with a true passion for social outreach. Ultimately aspiring to be a global physician and incorporate creative advocacy for health and environmental issues into her career path, Marjorie has combined several of her interests through the founding of I Like Fall, an online resale shop for Harvard students that has taken off in the past year. Marjorie has seen firsthand the challenges and rewards of starting a successful business during her undergraduate years, and has used I Like Fall as a platform to promote social issues of waste reduction, the redefinition of beauty, and the promotion of confidence and positive self-image in college women and men. Read on to learn more about Marjorie’s inspirational work here at Harvard, her post-grad plans, and what’s up next for I Like Fall. And if you’d like to hear more, come to Her Campus – Harvard, G-Chat, and the Women’s Leadership Project’s Women’s Week event this Sunday, March 10th from 4:30 to 6:00pm in Ticknor Lounge: “From Passion to Action: A Panel Discussion With Women Entrepreneurs Who Forged Their Own Paths”, on which Marjorie will be a featured student panelist!
First, the basics! Tell us a little about yourself — where are you from, what do you study, and what do you enjoy doing in your free time?
I am a born and raised Californian who lives for tacos, acoustic music, and anything that involves relaxing. I am a pre-med senior concentrating in Psychology with a secondary in Global Health and Health Policy. I have always been a make-it-yourself type of person, from prom dresses to random crafts, so I find myself spending a lot of my free time doing projects for my new Do-It-Yourself blog.
What are some of the extracurricular activities you are involved with on campus?
Over the past three-and-a-half years, I have filled my time with a variety of art-related activities. Every semester I have sung with KeyChange, (the best!) a cappella group, which sings music from the African Diaspora, including everything from Etta James to Bob Marley to Beyonce. More recently, I have worked as a freelance photographer and graphic designer for numerous groups on campus, as well as for non-profits and social organizations in the U.S. One of my favorite extracurriculars so far has been launching I Like Fall, an online resale shop for Harvard students. Already in its second year, it has grown a lot as both a business on campus and a socially conscious organization
What are your plans for this summer?
I have had incredible summers in the past, yet, after graduation, I may have a relatively simple one! I will be applying to medical school next year, so I will spend my summer preparing and studying for the MCAT exam. I will also travel to Haiti with my family for the first time in my life, so I’m excited to finally meet the family and friends my parents have talked about all my life!
What would be your dream job after graduation?
My immediate dream job after graduation (if it existed) would be to spend half of my time doing graphic design and photography for non-profit organizations, a quarter of my time engaging with some version of community outreach, and the other quarer of my job researching or analyzing community health behaviors. My dream career (way after I graduate) would be to work as a physician globally and somehow incorporate creative outreach to advocate for health and environmental issues.
So, tell us about I Like Fall! Where did you get the idea, and how did you turn it into a reality?
Well, it started quite casually actually! It was my junior fall and I had just received confirmation that I was accepted into my study abroad program for the upcoming spring semester. Soon after, I began to look around my room, contemplating how I would store everything and what I should pack. One thing I quickly noticed is how my closet had collected many items I no longer wore or never found the chance to wear. This started an evolution of ideas that culminated in setting up a ‘simple’ website so that I could pass on my otherwise great-condition clothes to those who would actually value them. I also found the idea that I could make spending money from such exchange to be appealing. After pulling in my friends as models and building the site, there was such a positive reception from other students wanting to buy, sell, and model that I hit the ground running. As with everything I do, I of course went a bit overboard (!) and began turning the idea into a business on campus.
What would you say has been the biggest challenge you have faced in getting the shop off the ground? What’s the most important thing you’ve learned from the process?
The biggest challenge overall was coming to terms with the fact that I am in no way a super human. In the beginning, I did everything from designing the site to photographing the models to picking up the clothes, to delivering the items, and anything else in between. We all need help. Though starting projects will always be most heavy-handed on the initiator, I was so set on getting the shop running that I lost sight of the extent of my capabilities and the powerful benefits of shared group work. As a result, over the past summer I added four new individuals to the board who each took on a distinct facet of the business, such as finance, community relations, styling, and photography. This semester we are again accepting new interns for graphic and web design. Having a team not only allowed me to concentrate my efforts to specific parts of I Like Fall, but it also helped me learn from my peers and opened up new directions for the business as a result of their own innovative ideas.
I Like Fall seems to be absolutely taking over our social media these days (and we love it!)! What new projects does I Like Fall have in store for us this semester? What are you most excited about going forward?
Haha, I guess we have! We love to share what’s being created, who’s involved, and the positivity we strive towards. This semester we will be testing out a few new avenues, including launching a men’s collection online as well as expanding to a few schools in the Boston area for a trial run. Something I am most excited for is simply watching how I Like Fall is transforming with time, with the ideals it embraces, and the rising new leadership.
Part of what we love about I Like Fall is its dedication to a meangingful social mission — can you tell us more about that?
Indeed, the reason I pursued the project so heavily was because I felt so strongly about the goals it promoted. After finishing a social documentary on food waste just the year prior to launching I Like Fall, I couldn’t help but notice the numerous ways in which waste has become a grossly regular facet of American life. Aside from the sheer sustainability approach we advocate for, our work photographing models for the site also led us towards promoting acceptance of a diversity of body types. Unlike most other fashion-oriented organizations that utilize photography on campus, we don’t have ‘tryouts’ for our models. Anyone, and everyone, who signs up gets an equal shot of being on the site and, so far, everyone who has wanted to model has been featured. If you’re dark-skinned, light-skinned, tall, short, curvy, thin — we care, but not for the reasons the general fashion industry does; we care because we think that such diversity (if only from the outside) is beautiful because it’s simply human. We don’t try to dismiss the body as if it doesn’t matter; our bodies matter — to us individually and to others around us — and so we work with simply re-shaping how we value the body to promote greater acceptance among college-aged individuals. This entire idea of accepting the entirety of an individual spreads into how we work as well. Our interns get to create their own positions based not just on what they are good at but also on what they love to do or learn. Essentially, we strive to create a platform where expression of oneself is thoroughly celebrated whether that is at a surface level or even deeper.
What do you think all girls should know and believe in?
I strongly feel that every person should believe in the strength of doing. Challenge what you think you know, take risks, ask questions, get your hands dirty. I believe that women, girls, young adults — anyone — should never let sparks of inspiration go by the wayside. There was a time when I thought creating I Like Fall was a form of ‘procrastination’ from the more important, academic work I ‘should’ have been doing. However, I quickly realized that the work, energy, and time I put into the business not only taught me incredibly valuable lessons in and of itself, but it helped me place concepts I learned in class into real-life contexts. The history of body size, environmental health care, women in leadership, social psychology — I found that I Like Fall was tying together every facet of my academic and social college experiences, and that was not procrastination. Lastly, I believe it is important to never assume there is one way you ‘should’ do something, that art or creativity cannot mix with other fields, and that you are not capable of impact.