Gus Reichwald

The following lessons were dedicated to designing and creating my mask. I had some drawings I had made earlier this year that gave me inspiration towards what the mask would look like. I picked one that would suit the function of the mask best (I wanted the user to be able to switch between the anti-facial recognition pattern and other fabrics) and started making the prototype out of clay. I really enjoyed this class since I had been aching to work with my hands and create something, the tutor Louise Day was also very helpful and relaxed which made it even better. I adjusted the details of my prototype as I went along until I thought it was finished. At this stage, the Covid-19 crisis was just becoming big enough that it was no longer possible to ignore.

I remember the last lesson before we went away on spring break and that everybody was talking about the virus and their anxiety, but I did not know at this point that I would not be able to come back and finish my mask. When the news came that the university would close down, I remember feeling sad about this specific course. I had grown more and more interested in making masks since I started working on it and I have been drawing ideas of masks ever since, so even if I can´t finish this particular mask I can still say that I gained something from the class. I do hope I can get the chance to do something similar again. One thing I have thought about that is quite ironic is that even though I can´t actually finish the project, the global pandemic we are now living in might prove to be more educational for Better Lives than any planned-out project could be.

All of a sudden, everybody on earth is facing a common problem, having to make drastic changes to our lifestyles, habits and priorities. We see difference in how people cope with change, how people take responsibility and we see people coming together to help each other in ways that no one would have thought about a year ago. I would like to think that most people will come out of this pandemic with a new humbler way of looking at the world and at each other. As I mentioned in the first post, the best way to create better lives is to try and see problems from different perspectives and I think the discussion about perspectives, inclusivity, responsibility and well-being is really now much more relevant than it was before Covid-19. A drastic change like this raises countless questions about the future, and when society and its inhabitants change, the designers must adapt. 

After all the lectures where finished I was a bit uncertain about how everything the lecturers had talked about would connect to my project. I had chosen mask making for performance as my course of choice and was not really sure about how this could apply to the different themes and perspectives of Better Lives. However, as soon as my mask making project started, I started getting a lot of ideas and I everything I had learned the previous weeks became more evident since it was being applied to a real-life project and not just ideas.

The mask making project asked us to create a mask that could connect to a political movement or idea and gave us numerous examples of this. I wanted to make something current and contemporary and thought about different political situations around the world. The one idea that stuck with me came from a news story I had seen on tv a couple of weeks earlier. It discussed the new facial recognition technology that is being used in parts of China and how it could instantly recognize and identify a person from a crowd.

The examples brought up included using the technology to spot J walkers crossing the road and showing their face on a billboard to shame them and to find wanted people. It also showed workplaces that used this technology to scan employees faces when they walked in the front door to register their exact time of arrival and keep a close eye on who was late. Most of the world outside of China do not use technology like this yet and many have spoken out against it, claiming it is a huge threat to personal integrity. There are arguments both against and for using facial recognition in public places and recently it has been discussed to imply it in London. Personally, I am quite skeptical towards it. Sure, it could make the police work faster and smarter to catch dangerous criminals and to locate missing people easier, but where is the line drawn? How much can we trust the people using the technology to only use it for good. A camera recording where you are at what time is valuable information for Data collecting companies that could make huge profits with this information and looking at the development of data collecting in the last decade, I have my doubts that this would be any different.

Since this debate was interesting to me, I wanted to create a mask for resisting this type of technology.  Doing research on this topic, I found a pattern that could supposedly disrupt this technology by confusing it. I wanted to use this pattern to create a stylish mask accessory to be used in protest against facial recognition being used in public places and registering people without their consent.

Moving forward with the other lectures I began to get used to the structure of the unit and the concept that the best way for me to digest all these different lectures was by applying them to myself and my own situation. I started to understand that this unit was different than the others, and the best approach for me was quite a personal one. The lectures served the purpose of bringing up different perspectives on how to create better lives for you and those around you through your work and how you choose to do it. A lecture that made this more evident for me was Jekaterina Rogatens lecture titled Well-Being. The contents of this lecture in particular was not something I would have expected to hear about before I started my course. Jekaterina talked about what the term well-being means, why it is important and how it can relate to fashion. She explained how the human brain is designed and why most people feel mentally down at some point as well as discussing the coping mechanisms and solutions we usually turn to in hard times.

The reasons why I personally enjoyed this lecture and why I will bring the knowledge I got from it with me is because it made me ask myself a question and dwell on it for days to come. Why do people find enjoyment in fashion? And is this enjoyment you get out of it something healthy or damaging to your well-being? The thing that keeps the fashion industry alive is the fact that people keep buying more clothes than they possibly need. This consumption is used by many as a quick way to feel better, even only for a little while. I remember Jekaterina breaking down the science behind feeling good after buying something, and how it is not sustainable since you have to keep doing it in increased amounts in order to stay happy. I am not a person that buys a lot of clothes, but this made me realize that some things I have bought in the past have been directly to minimize or distract me from other bad feelings.

The lecture also made me have a think about exactly why I am interested in fashion, exploring something that has always just seemed obvious to me. This was both necessary and healthy for me since I now know more about myself and what I want to do, which helps me both with motivation for this degree and for my general well-being. The last thing I got from the lecture was understanding that my own well-being must always be a priority. There is no point dragging myself down to try and achieve things in my work or social life since I won’t even be able to see the benefits from these things as long as I’m not happy with myself to begin with.

I´m not sure what I was expecting going into the Better Lives Unit, I think I was mostly curious about the live streamed lectures and what my mask-making course would be like in practice. Even though I read the summary of the unit before and flicked through the unit handbook I did not really think too hard about what the themes diversity, social responsibility and sustainability would mean to me throughout the unit. The very first lecture I attended was the one connected to the unit briefing which was Claire Swift giving an introduction to the theme Social Responsibility. She talked about a program for female inmates in the UK that were given a chance to learn a trade trough collaborating with designers, making a positive change. This story was moving but I can´t say it changed the way I think about working and social responsibility changed very much. Everybody knows there are injustices in the world and that there are people less fortunate than them but what makes a person actually commit to helping others and making a change? Hearing about other people doing good deeds can be inspiring but it does not necessarily make you actually do anything different yourself. It can even have an opposite effect if you can´t in any way relate to the people taking social responsibility and their motivation.

I believe that to truly inspire a person to want to make a positive change for other people, you need to shed light on seeing things from other perspectives than their own. To change the way a person works you need to change the way they think about their work and its meaning, all the way from the thought process to the way it is implemented in practice.  I think my reasoning about the first lecture made me appreciate the second lecture even more. The second lecture, which was right after the first one was held by Laura Salisbury and was titled Inclusion. Laura talked about being inclusive from a designer’s perspective and how using an inclusive way of thinking throughout the process could benefit everyone involved. She also highlighted the importance of looking at a problem or a task from different perspectives and the issues with not doing so. Most of her examples included new or emerging technologies, which made the lecture feel more relevant and current. Even though I´m not a designer myself, the way of thinking she spoke of intrigued me and has stuck with me since. I´m a person who can get stuck in my own head sometimes and I have not always put in an effort to see things from other people’s perspectives, but after that lecture I will feel more prompted to always take a second, more inclusive look at my work.