Conscious Creation | aspirations and commitments
Conscious Creation is a project thats helping me to process the world - through thought, through design, through trying things out, through creation. My work has always arisen from a need to have a positive influence on the world around me and is based deeply in my ethical beliefs - hoping to put them into practice! Navigating a world that is dominated by systems I am very critical of is a difficult path to find, a constantly evolving work in progress. But then aren't we all!
My aspirations and commitments aim to use creation as a powerful regenerative tool for the environment, people and other beings around us.
The materials I work with are a mixture of conscious investment into what I want more of, or repurposed existing materials that are unwanted and wasted. I've thought carefully about what ethical means to me and ways I can ensure that I am following my ethics the best I can.
I aim for all materials to be:
- Always vegan
- Organic as far as possible
- Circular in their life-time - either biological, reusable or recyclable
- Fairtrade wherever possible
- Low-carbon, zero-carbon or carbon positive
- Used to their fullest capacity, finding uses for all scraps
I believe in handmade crafts as a beautiful way to create value in items. Seeing the work that goes into our products and the hands that shaped them goes beyond financial value to incorporate social value - a bit of love and care. I offer made to order work, so we can co-create together and ensure every purchase is wanted, appreciated and special. I believe this plays a crucial role in fostering a more considered, slower and less wasteful relationship with resource use.
I am working to make my supply chain transparent, giving information on every stage of the co-creation process. It is far more difficult to uncover than I had even feared and will be a work in progress. For now I am having to apply the idea of 'do what you can, change what you can't' and am questioning, calling out and lobbying for supply transparency from every supplier who can't provide the information.
Prices are worked out to reflect resource and time input, rather than value of output.
For adult clothing requiring differing amounts of time and resource for different sizes, prices are levelled and redistributed to achieve equity for all bodies.
Any profits made from purchases are redistributed to charities, campaign groups and activists working for marginalised voices and planet.
I am currently supporting
- The Food Empowerment Project - fighting for food justice in the intersection between species, class and race
- The Clean Clothes Campaign - campaigning for workers rights within the textiles industry
- The Retreat Animal Rescue - providing a life for maltreated or unwanted animals, based in Kent
Whilst I am critical and saddened by much of the injustice inflicted by humans on this world, the creation side of this project manifests my belief in the potential of creativity as a force of activism and change. I see culture, art and design as powerful tools at our disposal: to shape the view we have of the world and others, to influence the behaviours we adopt and ultimately to shape the world itself.
"The future can't be predicted, but it can be envisioned and brought lovingly into being"
- Donella Meadows