Sunday 6th June, midday till 7pm, FREE. Regents Park.
Mayari’s trash to treasure workshop will be held in the big tent of LCRN (London Community Recycling Network) and start at 12:30, 14:30 and 16:30. Come with an empty beverage carton (the one with the square bottom) and go with a beautiful Change Wallet and an upcycled Upcycling Awareness Ribbon! It’s all free of charge.
Velo:re is a London based enterprise specialised in making lovely products from bike tires and tubes. They started off with a searies of lovely and unique belts which are featured on these limited edition of customized Card Holders by Mayari.
As you might know I am making my re*creations while educating myself. Today I watched yesterday’s SF’s Club - a talk about The Dalai Lama.
He is one of my inspirational role models. Once more he showed me, how wise he is. I’ll tell you why:
It is said, that many Tibetians, especially the young ones, are angry. They don’t think the peaceful way is the best solution anymore. Now, what was remarkable is, that The Dalai Lama himself thought about how it would be if the Tibetians would take up weapons and fight! He even talks about how one could or could not import weapons into Tibet on TV (note that he never laughs while doing so and you might know how normally he likes to laugh). Wow, he examines mentally how it would be to fight and - despite fighting is not according to his belief at all - comes to the conclusion that the Tibetians would have no chance fighting against the Chinese anyway.
See, wise people can tink about things from different perspectives. And so does the Dalai Lama. And it seems like he knows how to address different peoples differently. He is lucky. He has (or takes) the time to contemplate. He is not only a holy reincarnation, he also has the media and therefore publicity and therefore power. He can speak up and educate wisely i.e. explain and suggest things. I think this is the better solution to most of our problems.
Furthermore I was thinking. If the young Tibetians want to do something, they should (if they may) go to China and live with the “enemies” in peace and show them, that we are all human. Of course, this is much more difficult than shooting someone death and would take more than one second till you see an effect. However, slow integration would be a sustainable and beneficial solution for both parties! Even - the Tibetians have the privilege to say: “Our leader is a wise man respected by many people from different backgrounds despite having not much money!” Tibetians can profit from his peaceful image that is (still) part of the Tibet culture of today. The Dalai Lama is powerful in his own way. Not to compare with the Chinese leaders…
I have been living in China. I know how the Chinese are influenced by their leaders (I almost want to say brain washed). I know how they treat the Japanese in their country. But I also have a lot of clever, young and curious Chinese friends who feel confident thinking different. They may be different - unlike their parents when they were young. I believe in the power of the internet. It makes one be able to think for yourself - you have to because there are too many statements for which you can find the exacte opposite statement. Yes, there is also much bad stuff in the Internet but I claim if you know how it is to be loved, no matter what happens, and to love someone back (and most single child Chinese youngsters know about love - they get it from parents and both grand parents) the bad things will seldom have a chance to overwrite the good things. Not even if your love (for the Tibetioans this is their land, their people) is taken and threatened. The ones who love are stronger than the ones who hate.
Just like the Dalai Lama I come to the conclusion that education (intellignece) and compassion (empathy - a potential more often found in the female gender) is the better, a very long lasting way for peace because it is based upon understanding and a pure heart. Not fear, ignorance, megalomania and a distracted heart. I believe in the survival of the smartest, kindest and most optimistic, shiny, happy people. That is - if people’s minds are free.
Thank you all very much for your comments on YouTube. You made me very happy!
You would like to know how to make Recycled Magic Wallets? Here is the answer I wrote on YouTube:
Hello all VNP’s (v. nice ppl)!
Thank you so much for your lovely comments! You made a young designer very happy!
I’m in favour of open source projects and I would like to see many, many Recycled Magic Wallets in use; I’d like to give out a tutorial. But I’m afraid I can’t afford this yet:( Sorry, I need to get sth out of it as I try not to go back doing meaningless jobs for money. I hope you understand.
My question: what or how much would you be willing to give in return?
Tanja alias Mayari
I hope you can understand what I mean. This copy might sound a little rude. I didn’t mean it that way. It is just a little frustrating. As a designer I put so much energy into this product. I made countless prototypes to make it perfect. Now it hurts a little just giving the “how to” out for free at this early stage where I could need every help (yes, also money).
However, did you see that there is a tutorial on YouTube already. I know it’s not the same as the Recycled Magic Wallets but it might give you an idea.
If you have any skill you could offer me, any connections or any other way to help making the wallets and Mayari’s re*creations more popular (maybe someone who would like to sponsor me) please get in touch! It doesn’t always have to be money (although money can buy/help a lot) - just something valuable that you can give in return. Sharing to me means equally giving and taking. Thank you so much for your understanding!
I hereby promise you, that once I have no worries about my own finances (yes, I have them finding no job - even in rich Switzerland) and once I have been able to work together with a woman’s project in a poor area of the world (this could be somewhere in the Philippines, my mom’s home) producing and inventing new re*creations, I will give out tutorials for earlier projects, like the Recycled Magic Wallet for you to make it yourself. But this is all still in my dreams, maybe it’s a crazy dream, a difficult dream and people come up with x reasons why I can’t make it and I know it’s very, very, very not easy - but it’s possible! Please bear with me, follow me (on facebook) and be the first to find out when this time has come.
T H I N K I N G O U T L O U D
The good thing about my passion: working on my designs like the Recycled Magic Wallets - is, that I can both do my work, listening to podcasts or - my favorite - watching TED talks at the same time. I love crafting, learning and dreaming of how the world could be better simultaneously - it gives me a flow: Time passes and I don’t even realise it.
D R E A M I N G
I start dreaming. Dreaming of how one day all my skills I am practicing, and my knowledge I am collecting now, will all come together, will make sense and will help many other people.
M Y V I S I O N
I do have a dream. I have a vision. It involves design of course, but that’s a vague term. Everything can be - and in our world is - desigend. Mostly not as good - I mean ethical and ecological - as it should be, I think.
My vision involves making desirable products while saving on raw materials. Dematerializing the world by adding true - I mean honest/authentic - meaning to objects, producing real - I mean tangible/useful - value, which of course has its prize. Social entrepreneurism, travelling the world, education. Showing and explaining poor people the industrialized societies - including the bad sides of it. Empowerment, listening, observing, leading, connecting via new media, exchanges of experiences… all that circulates in my head.
Making money due to labour and materia - rather than due to a story that was made up. (I believe remarkable things inherently have a good i.e. authentic story behind - no need to invent a story to blow up the product or service, like Moleskine did I read in brand eins magazine’s issue about marketing.) If brand stories - than the true story told in a poetic way. The ones listening with their hearts - like le petit prince does - will understand. But no lies. Never lies. That’s my motto.
M Y D R E A M
I have a dream that poor people will have a chance to produce adorable, trustworthy stuff for demanding wealthy people. I have a dream that the rich would be willing to pay a fair price for it. I have a dream that people stop taking and taking and taking from the earth - never giving anything back. I have a dream that there will be more equality on earth. More diversity. I’m a dreamer.
M Y A C T I O N S
Now you know my dream - and probably it is one of the biggest dreams one can have. It’s good to dream big dreams. But dreaming is not enough to me. I keep trying to take baby steps in the right direction. Towards my dream. I watch TED, I make my wallets, I’m trying to find a meaningful job in London within a great team, meeting nice, influential and aspirational people to collaborate with. I keep trying to articulate my vision putting bits and pieces of me out to the public via all my online social media channels. One day, all these acts will sum up and draw a clear picture, I hope. I keep working and the direction I’m heading is forward and upwards knowing that drawbacks are important parts of this way. I do so because we cannot not change the world.
O N E D A Y
One day, I would like to stand in front of a TED audience and share my experiences I will have made by then with the world. To inspire people just the same way as today’s speakers do inspire me now. In favour of our possible future. By telling the world my story - a stroy of a tinkerer and inventor, a social designer and entrepreneur, a nomadic crafts woman as agile and free (thinking) as a lunar moth.
M E
A creative who’s design principles are different and a bit crazy: who’s ideal workshop fits into a backback, who wants to go out and see the world - much more - to interact with disadvantaged people. To make friends with good people. To understand each other. To work together. For more equality. For more happiness. For more meaning. For more moments of flow. Optimistcly and productively.
I T ‘ S B E E N D O N E B E F O R E
Some change lifes with music. Others do it with photography. Others again with new media. With banking. With a good piece of art. With science/knowledge. With money, power and belief. I am trying to do it with what I do best: making things out of no/things. Things from waste. From useless to valuable. So far by myself. Just because I haven’t found like-minded and equally crazy people yet. Or maybe my communication wasn’t too good i.e clear and convincing. Or having almost no money makes me feel weak, inferior and less social - I know it’s silly and shouldn’t be affecting me so much.
A N A N A L O G Y
I sometimes like to see myself as a modern American Indian Woman. She used to make use of all things she could find that the environment offered her. For example she made use of all parts of a bison. She didn’t need electricity to produce wonderful and/or useful things. Just her hands. Likewise am I trying to design and create my little things - just in a very, very different environment. The “old Indian way” of doing things surely restricts me. It gives me negative feedback as modern people at times don’t like my old-fashioned way of manually fixing things together. Sometimes, I tend to give in and try out suggested ways using power tools - other times, I am proud of my principles and try to stick to it.
H I G H - V E R S U S L O W - T E C H
People wonder. Why not using our modern technology? Electricity? Why denying our progress? I am not. In fact, I love my iPhone and my MacBook. My life without these tools would rather be miserable, I think. However, I don’t need them - to be precise - I choose not to use them for producing most of my physical designs. Instead, I choose to use these modern tools to connect to people, to learn, to entertain myself, to communicate - not to make my characteristic crafts/products.
I often believe it would be easier to mix high-tech and low-tech to make new things. However, in a complex world, the easiest way is not always the best i. e. most ethical and ecological way to go. It’s a bigger challenge to only stick to low-tech principles. So far, I have always taken the more challenging way. I stay with low-tech for my little things. I can be very stubborn.
W O R K I N G O N B I G T H I N G S
Am I happy? Yes. But not enough. I would love to team up with like-minded people. Because I sometimes feel lonely and I believe together we can make bigger changes. It’s good to start with the self. But Recycled Magic Wallet and other little prducts for Mayari, that’s how far I can go as a single person. I wish to do more. To enter the high-tech world maybe, still producing as ethically and ecologically as possible. Working with other specialists, exchanging ideas, creating big, yet good things. Impossible to do that all alone. Or maybe it is? But not to me. I love teamwork!
A N Y I D E A S ?
Do you know a place I - a designer and inventor who is deeply thinking about our social system and environmental impacts - would fit in? If yes - please let me know! Thanks so much!
Design seems to have a good reputation. Whenever I say: “I’m a designer.” most people instinctively go “wow!” or “cool!”. (And maybe go on thinking: oh poor you - it’s not a proper job that pays the bills - does it?) I wonder why.
Creation seems to be desirable. But why is it not valued as much? Why do people shifting around numbers, thinking and talking or writing earn much more than people shifting ideas into reality (not to mention the people who actually shift the material itself)? How would the world look like without designers and makers? Lots of numbers and ideas, few material (or digital) manifestations. Maybe that would even be better… I doubt it. Most of us are not monks. Most of us are consumers. Ideas alone often don’t make us happy.
See. Do you know “ice-cream”? Now. What do you prefer: Thinking of having ice-cream or really having ice-cream? Or. Do you know “attractive”? Do you know “BMW” (status), “Chanel” (beauty) or… whatever you and/or people you care about think makes you more attractive to them and/or yourself. So now. What do you prefer: Thinking of having a BMW or Chanel or really having a BMW or Chanel? And. Listen to your gut feeling - so often it is stronger.
People come and say: “Oh I have an idea and I spent a lot of time thinking about it! It’s great! But now I need you. Would you please create a leaflet, a banner or a logo for me? And oh yes, it’s for tomorrow!” I can and will. But guess what: I have ideas as well! Plenty of them. But you don’t even want to know. Because your ideas are better. Because yours are undermined by statistics and researches - valuable statistics and time consuming researches. How about the big picture? Hidden emotions? Ethics? How about my experiences? But you have no time to listen to the ignorant designer’s view. Or no patience? Or it’s not within your scope? Fair enough then. Let’s stick to the numbers and perform within time… I’ll make real what you think because you need me to make it look remarkable. But don’t blame me if we miss on something where I could have helped you.
I started at Futerra as an intern and after one month I was offered a position as a junior designer. Now, I mainy create graphics (websites, banners, leaflets, invites, communication guides, brand guidelines, logos, namecards etc.) For sure, work never gets boring; we have a lot of exciting and diverse clients, all having their unique needs while all doing good stuff.
Since our company combines PR, Strategy, Engage and Design we help each other where we can. That means being able to multitask (Lulu I’m taking you as an example) and sometimes being exposed in the media ourselves. That’s why I made it to BBC news already;) in an article covering Swishing (an event where you can swap your no longer wanted clothes with friends invented by our lovely Lucy.) Find me also in the viral clip we helped producing for Shell Springboard funding business helping to cut CO2 emissions.
There is more to come! Watch out for a project we are doing with DFID in collabroation with squint opera. I can’t tell more at this stage but as soon as I can publish the photos, I will post it. I promise - it’s great!
This is what a McKinsey research found out. It’s how the people and companies outperform and in the end earn more money according to the study. But people are not willing to relocate. Not only because it’s a hassle but also because they think it’s bad for their career prospects.
Companies should try to find ways to promote the rotating of talents not only globally to have greater cultural diversity but also within silos (different functions within a company) to get more valuable knowledge experience.
I see: It’s a benefit to understand other cultures and other areas of your business. - Hip hip hurray to diversity!