Born in Winnipeg, raised on the globe

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This article was published 21/03/2020 (2019 days ago), so information in it may no longer be current.

With more than 24,000 Instagram followers, ex-Winnipegger Holly Rose has influence.

The 35-year-old uses her platform to share her passion for environmentalism and soil advocacy.

“In the grand scheme of things it is a small following, but I do have a responsibility, I think, with the information I’m sharing,” Rose says by phone from her home in Hastings, a seaside town 90 minutes southeast of London. “I make sure I fact-check what I share before I share it, even if it’s an Instagram story and it will disappear in 24 hours.”

Rose’s Instagram account is part of two multimedia web projects, HollyRose.eco and GatherGrounded.eco.

The pieces she writes are “created with the intention of holistically marrying and amplifying traditional ecological knowledge, sacred ecology and scientific restoration,” she explains on her website. “I try to write in a way which enhances my reader’s nature-relatedness, encouraging relationships of reciprocity with all living things.”

“I believe that by amplifying education on regeneration, promoting tales of provenance, and prioritizing on equality, we can restore our lands and with it, our communities,” she adds.

Born in Winnipeg, Rose and her two younger sisters were raised by their mother, Susan. The family lived in public housing and wore second-hand clothes when Rose was young, in part because it was all they could afford, but also because it was better for the planet.

Susan Rose was involved in community organizing related to climate justice and Indigenous rights, and the family ate a vegetarian diet.

“When I was a teenager, my rebellion was becoming a cheerleader, wearing pink, dyeing my hair blond and eating McDonald’s,” Rose tells the Free Press.

After graduating from Kelvin High School in 2002, Rose spent time in England so she could get to know her father and brothers.

When she returned, she studied at the University of Winnipeg, where she started writing about fashion for the Uniter.

When she graduated with a diploma in public relations, Rose started travelling the world. Along the way, she started Leotie Lovely, a brand of handbags crafted from upcycled materials sourced in Winnipeg.

When she settled in Paris to be with her now-husband about seven years ago, she was ready to leave handbags behind.

Unable to work because she didn’t know French, she took to writing online about sustainable fashion as a way to stay busy and make money while learning the language.

A few years later, her focus shifted again.

“I definitely don’t believe we can buy our way to a greener future,” she says. “I’d written about everything I felt I could write about as it related to sustainable living, and I’m in my mid-30s now, so I was looking for a way to not be flouncing around in linen dresses on Instagram.”

Rose and her husband, an actor, filmmaker and photographer, moved from Paris to Hastings last year.

In October, she started working part time as the development manager for the Green Party of England and Wales. She helps the party tell stories that explain its policies in a way a generation raised on Instagram can get excited about.

“I’ve learned a lot,” says Rose, who believes that grassroots action and political action go together. “It’s filled me with more hope than anxiety, and that’s something I’ve been trying to do with my writing over the last few years: alleviate anxiety by offering stories of hope alongside information that’s fact-checked and peer-reviewed.”

Along the way, Rose emphasizes the interconnectedness of all living things, and that social justice is necessarily intersectional.

She does as much as she can to honour and spotlight the people and movements that have given rise to the values and actions she promotes.

“I try to… uplift other people’s voices and see if there’s anything I can add to the conversation, rather than making my voice the centre of the conversation,” she says.

When asked what she would say if she had just one message for people, Rose responds with two things.

“Start thinking about where the ingredients come from for each item you use and every morsel of food you eat. If we think of provenance, we will start to consume less,” she says.

“Spend more time in nature, because you can’t love what you don’t know,” she adds. “And in Manitoba, we have so many places to go spend time outdoors.”

Even though she’s 6,000 kilometres away, the keystone province is never far from her mind.

“I’m definitely a Winnipegger at heart, forever and always,” she says. “I haven’t lost my accent or my roots there.”

aaron.epp@gmail.com