Sheldon Chow

I had the privilege of attending the lectures for a second round now as this year’s unit leader and someone who was involved in the delivery last year. This year, I really wanted to actively listen for content that I had not picked up last year. While not related to the lecture reflection directly, what this makes me think about is the benefit of lecture recordings and the ability to go back and review what was said.

I think the most fundamental way the lectures have influenced my thinking in this regard is to be more connected. In Kate Fletcher’s lecture she challenged us to identify a number of plants, insects and animals from the local London environment. Out of the three I was only able to identify the tree. Kate then challenged us to identify brands from logos. It was easy for me to guess the majority of brands. This was an effective way for Kate to demonstrate my disconnect from nature. If we are not connected to our environment in a more intimate way then how will this enter our consciousness on a day-to-day so that we consider the environment in the work we do to become more sustainable? 

I think that connectedness was a theme that ran through most of the lectures. This was particularly relevant to John Lau’s Cultural Sustainability and Teleica Kirkland’s Representation lectures. For me the theme of connectedness in culture is still present but perhaps in a less direct way. While we are all connected to nature directly as we live in nature, we may not be directly connected to all cultures. For example, John talked about culture being more than race and gave some examples such as punk, mod and kawaii culture. Whilst we might not be into punk, mod or kawaii culture, the point being that if we are interested in this culture and want to take inspiration from it for our work in fashion, we need take the time to properly research these cultures and become in a way connected to it so that we can as best as possible avoid appropriation of that culture. This was elegantly demonstrated by John when he discussed “The Great Wave” painting and how understanding that East Asian cultures read from left to right rather than from right to left changes the meaning and interpretation of the painting.

This connectedness in fact reminds me of the Buddhist teaching of mindfulness. Mindfulness “is the basic human ability to be fully present, aware of where we are and what we’re doing” (What is mindfulness?, 2014). So in conclusion, my main take-away is that that by being more connected and mindful in our day-to-day, thinking about how we can be more sustainable or inclusive in fashion will be somewhat easier because it will be present in our minds. Thinking about not only what we’re doing but how it is connected to nature, cultures and people can help us to improve our work in the fashion industry whether we’re a fashion educator, designer, editor, photographer, marketer, etc.

References

Fletcher, K. (2020) ‘ Nature’ [Lecture]. Better Lives, London College of Fashion, 12 February.

Kirkland, T. (2020) ‘ Representation’ [Lecture]. Better Lives, London College of Fashion, 19 February.

Lau, J. (2020) ‘ Cultural Sustainability’ [Lecture]. Better Lives, London College of Fashion, 18 February.

What is mindfulness? (2014) Available at: https://www.mindful.org/what-is-mindfulness/ (Accessed: 25 February 2020).

Image Credit

Sheldon Chow, 2020