Think you’re seeing double? It may be Ashley and Haley Mlinar.
The twins, both freshman studio art majors, have made a name for themselves at Eastern, often being seen wearing matching clothing, taking the same classes or enjoying the same hobbies, like reading and playing video games.
Ashley and Haley say their similar interests and styles started when they were young, with the exception of kindergarten when they would wear similar clothes in different colors.
“After that, we were like ‘no, we want to dress the same,’ so we’ve just been dressing the same because it’s just fun,” Ashley said.
They say their similar interests were formed more by their shared upbringing and life experiences rather than their connection as twins.
“Since we’re the same age and were raised the same way most of our interests and things are the same,” Haley said.
As the twins continued their education together, they say it made the transition easier.
“I would say it definitely made it easier because I had my sister with me so it wasn’t too different, just like a different location because she was still there,” Haley said.
“And we weren’t coming here with no one that we knew,” Ashley said. “We had someone who’s our roommate, but is also our sister so it made it extremely easy. But this is easier having your sister with you.”
As the twins have so many similarities, they often deal with misconceptions surrounding who they are as individuals.
“We do have a lot of the same interests, but we are individuals,” Ashley said.
In high school, they said few people tried to learn the difference between the two of them, which has carried over into college with some talk of them on social media referring to their similar styles.
And while being a twin and around other twins in their family has made seeing twins normal for them, they think their similarities may come off as strange to those who are not from the same background.
“(When we got to Eastern) we were walking together and seeing people like side-eyeing and looking back and forth between us to see that we were like looking the exact same, it was kind of funny,” Haley said.
“I never considered this before, but because we’re so used to being twins we don’t think that it’s strange to other people to see two people that look exactly the same walking next to each other,” Ashley said.
But, how can you tell who is Ashley and who is Haley?
For starters, Ashley’s favorite color is a toss-up between pink and blue, while Haley’s is purple.
Hayley parts her hair on the left and her dominant hand is her left hand. Ashley parts her hair on the right and her dominant hand is her right hand.
Haley is slightly taller than Ashley and Ashley has freckles whereas Haley does not.
The twins say as people spend more time around them, it becomes easier to find ways to tell them apart, saying it is nice when people take interest in learning about them as individual people.

Corryn Brock can be reached at 581-2812 or at deneic@gmail.com.