Blog 2. Theme Reflection
After the outbreak of Covid-19 in my home country, Italy, I was self-isolating in my room in West London and since then I have been home trying to don’t let the situation overwhelm me and to reflect on my own perspectives about the pandemic and my future afterwards. A week later, I found out that my mom would start working at the hospital in front line to help the patients and save their lives.
The unit of better lives, honestly, did not help me over this difficult time to reflect or improve my way of thinking and working for the future. Although, the useful thing of this whole academic unit, during Covid-19 outbreak, was learning how to adapt to limited spaces, materials and resources to complete my creative assignment for Fashion Portrait photography. For example, I could not, of course, meet new people for photoshoot, but I have decided to use Facetime and take pictures of friends who have diverse epitomes. One of them is my friend Edoardo from Italy who actually is known as well as LoLa, he’s proudly part of the Drag scene of Milano, and since the beginning we have been working together to develop the character and aesthetic of LoLa. I really appreciated them for helping me with my project, but the best thing we gained from this experience was being all socially responsible on others and not leaving our homes to go and shooting pics around the city. Therefore, social responsibility is, in my opinion, the most relevant theme of this unite because it guided me and my peers to respect our society in this critical time.
Generally, my favorite theme among others has been Sustainability. This is because, In the recent months, I have been writing articles and curating the public relations of the new issue of MESS MAGAZINE called “Sustainable x Conscious”. This made me discover and meet real evangelists of the sustainable fashion wave of designers and entrepreneurs of the industry. Essentially, writing and researching about them, made me get to the conclusion that the whole industry might turn page after the Covid-19 crisis and become more sustainable. How, you can wonder…? This unit alongside my job, made me understand that being a vegan since almost 3 years now, is not enough to help our planet. This is because, Sustainability does not only refer to reduce the production and consume of clothes but in my opinion, it is more about the life and work conditions of the employees and the promotion of supporting local shops. Therefore, I have stopped buying in high street shops but now I usually buy in secondhand shops or in local and niche stores. Overall, this theme of Better lives makes you reflect not only on the global unsustainable situation but more about your own footprint and how you could help to improve the environment and I found my way.