Mai Qiu’s 2th Blog Post

Blog 2

This blog is mainly to share with you the impact of Better Lives unite on the way I work in the future. The theme of Better Lives unit is divided into three parts, the first is sustainability, the second is diversity, and the third is social responsibility. In my first blog post, I mainly focused on the topic of sustainability, so I also chose to elaborate the impact on my future work from this topic.

First of all, the biggest impact on me should be the impact on my consciousness. This shows when I make decisions, I will make more careful decisions because of the situations mentioned in our lecture. This means more sensitive self-monitoring and self reflection. For example, when I want to print my unit handbook, and you know they are very long, maybe 20 or 30 pages of paper. Usually I will simply click the print button on my computer without any thinking, and then a stack of printing paper inserted to the printer will become my unit handbook. Now I will hesitate before pressing that button, can I make the page layout more compact? Can I set up to print two-sided paper? Do I really need to print these documents? Can I read some documents on the tablet. These subtle differences in work may only change a little and have a little impact at present, but in the long run, if everyone has a more careful consciousness, it will have more impact than just a stack of printed papers in my hand. I know it sounds like a cliche, but it’s also an irrefutable fact. Second, as a styling student, it is an important part of my work to find the garment resources for shooting. My more careful decision-making will help me in this part of the work, also more in line with the ethical. I more want to avoid the purchase of the form of access to my one-time shot garment resources, because it is unsustainable. I am more and more willing to rent or borrow to get the sources of the garment to replace the purchase. As I accumulated my experience and qualifications, this became more and more easy for me. I found that there are many independent designers and student designers. They have many excellent works. Their works may not be commercialised, so they may not get a lot of media exposure. They may only do such one piece for a certain project. I usually find them through social media, I contact them, and ask for example “would you like to lend me this coat from your certain series? I want to fashion shoots about a certain theme. I think your overcoat will be very suitable.” This is a truly win-win and efficient way to use resources. Their works can draw more attentions through the fashion content I produced. I also have garments to complete my work. At the same time, I will not generate more unnecessary one-time consumption. I’m glad that the designers and showrooms I’ve met so far are willing to accept such cooperation requests. Otherwise, if I want to continuously produce fashion content, maybe my whole bedroom will be used to stuff clothes I won’t wear, and I’m trying to avoid this from happening.