Anshikha Tomar

Peer Review Task

While browsing through the blog posts to write a peer’s review I came across a blog that I instantly connected to. It was a blog post by Seung Oh on ‘diversity’ and how the unit lectures might change her work in the future. I found out how the two of us have common perspectives and concerns and that’s one of the reasons I chose to review her blog. Not only this but also the work that she produced for her Better lives project looked quite interesting and diverse to me. I like how she though out of the box and did justice to her topic. Diversity as a whole this unit was one topic that I really reflected on and that’s what I found common between the two of us. I like how she started by talking about all 3 pillars of the unit which are sustainability, social responsibility and diversity. Then she spoke about how ‘diversity’ had an impact on her thought process and how curious she was to discover this particular pillar. 

I was very captivated by Seung Oh’s concerns and I like how she put her stand on diversity forward without any hesitation stating that efforts still need to be put in the industry to promote diversity as it is ‘still lying in an indefinite boundary where improvements are taken as tokenism’. Being an international student myself, coming from diverse backgrounds I could completely relate to her. She also spoke about how she wants to challenge herself by understanding everyone’s perspective, understanding the differences also how she wants to make positive changes for future generations which really inspired me.

One thing I really wish she could have emphasised more on was how has it impacted her personal life and how would she use what she learnt in the future rather than emphasising more on the fashion industry. Overall, I absolutely loved how she put what she felt forward and how engrossed she is in the idea of diversity.

Blog Post 3 Project Outcome- Fashion Activism

The project that I chose for the Better Lives unit was Fashion Activism. As a Fashion Styling student I thought Creative Direction will further help me with my future projects. I was also very curious to explore this particular field further. The Better Lives unit and its three main pillars sustainability, diversity and social responsibility have had a major impact on my thinking. As a part of the Fashion Activism project this unit I learnt a lot. In our first class itself we were assigned into groups. At first, I was a little nervous to get out of my comfort zone and work with people from different courses but it actually turned out to be quite exciting. Each one of us came from not only different courses but different countries too and that is when I thought about diversity and looked forward to working with them. Combing everyone’s different ideas from their specific expertise into one was quite challenging and interesting. It also made me realise how diverse everyone’s thoughts are.

We as a group got ‘Nubian Skin’ as our brand to research on. We were told to make a moving image for the same. When we researched the brand, we saw there wasn’t a lot of male figures so we decided to add more transparency to our work. Before the Easter break we had made our mood board, decided how and where are we going to shoot. However things did not turn out the way we expected them to because of the pandemic and the way we are working right now has drastically changed and is completely opposite to our expectations. Nonetheless we still tried our best and found a way to connect digitally through zoom calls and figured out a way to still proceed with our idea but in a different way altogether. We added a lot of illustrations and made it look graphically pleasing as we didn’t have the equipment to shoot with due to the lockdown. 

Overall, I had a more positive thought towards the turn that this whole unit took. This whole situation was in itself a new experience for me. It taught me how the same amount of work can be produced on time even from different parts of the world. Experimenting and engaging with the Better Lives unit and visual language has made me consider the issues in a fashion context. I am glad that we were able to relate our work to one of the Better lives theme which is ‘Diversity’.

The three main topics that we engaged with in this unit were sustainability, social responsibility and diversity. This unit made me reflect on the work that I have done in the past and the work that I will be doing in the future. Since the beginning I always I took sustainability and social responsibility into consideration however I never thought about diversity as such. The lectures as well as being a part of the Fashion Activism project for this unit got me thinking about all these topics even more. It made me believe how we all together can make a difference. From discussing how there has been a fashion revolution where brands in nowadays have been quite sustainable by selecting renewable energy sources to discarded clothes being recycled to questioning where the clothes have been made in the case of fast fashion.  We also discussed how brands like United Colours of Benetton, Burberry, Diesel have been promoting diversity since quite a bit time now. I learnt how the fashion industry is bringing up the issues of the real world such as diversity and not promoting only what people want to see. 

Studying and discovering the creative directive side of brands and their campaigns was quite interesting. Understanding how various aspects like location, colour, fonts, casting, styling, hair and makeup, story etc play a huge and vital role in a campaign was also some new information for me. Overall, I noticed how not only sustainability but diversity too is beginning to be an important aspect among the industry. However after doing a lot of research, I have come to a conclusion that there is not enough diversity throughout the industry and more awareness spread about it could bring it closer to being is not only “sustainable” but also “diverse”.

As a fashion styling student my aim is going to be able to produce as sustainable work as possible by using recycled clothes and accessories for styling, promoting sustainable brands by collaborating with them. Not only that I will try to be as diverse as possible. I hope I am able to spread more awareness of the changes that are needed in the fashion industry through my work.

Throughout these two weeks of the Better Lives unit, the lecture that I could connect the most with was the one by Lorraine Gamman on Empathy. The way she connected empathy to fashion was what drew my attention to this lecture. Empathy is something that we all possess in our day to day lives. In the beginning she spoke about empathy, our emotional response and understanding. She started by connecting empathy and the arts, like theatre, film, paintings make us step into someone else’s shoes and makes us see things from their perspective and how they feel about it.  She also spoke about the exhibition she did where people could listen to the stories of the prisoners in order to understand their situations better.

She spoke about empathic design and how fashion reaches out to different people differently. A designer has to look at a number of aspects like the audience, what are their needs, how will they perceive their work etc. Later she explained empathy probes and different phases of research which were discovery, immersion, connection and detachment. It was quite fascinating to realise how most of us already do this unknowingly to understand the feelings of the other person in a better way. She also spoke about the “Design Against Crime Research Centre” that she set up and discussed about the way how bags are designed and the “use” and “abuse” of bags. She further emphasised on ‘design against crime’ which really drew my attention as I never thought about this before. I like how she went in depth about psychology behind crime. She also referred to ‘The Empathy Instinct’ Bazalgotte (2012) which stated that ‘empathy is partial’ and ‘not simply a good thing’. When I came to think of it I realised how human nature is not only influenced by other people’s emotions but also environmental factors and their surroundings.

All the lectures in this unit have taught me something or the other and have further enlightened my take on sustainability, diversity and social responsibility in fashion. As a fashion styling student it made me realise how I should think about empathy and be more empathetic in all that I do not only work related but as a whole in my personal life as well. 

References: 

Gamman, L (2020) “Empathy” [Lecture]. Better Lives, London College of Fashion, 25^th February.

Bazalgotte. P. (2012) The Empathy Instinct: How to create a more civil society. London. John Murray Publishers.