Soft Skills

2023 -

I have run several workshops for children, where they each design a personal fan-scarf. The children experience a creative process from sketch to finished object, and receive a unique gift that expresses their confidence at the end of it. Each child selects slogan, symbols or drawings that represent their dreams and aspirations and composes them on a piece of paper in the ratio of the scarf. The scarf becomes a wearable talisman that cheers them on into a hopeful, positive future (and keeps them warm and looks good!!).

The first scarves were made during my artist residency with F.A.T. Studio’s OKR Arts Club on Old Kent Road  in South-East London (in a neighbourhood were I used to live)  in 2023. I ran two workshops at the Refugio Kunstwerkstatt in Munich last winter 2024, and another workshop in March 2025 with students of the International Transitional Class (ISK) of Het Stedelijk Lyceum at Concordia Gallery in Enschede in the Netherlands.

My aim with the workshops and scarves was to generate conversations around new ideas of ‘skills’, ‘work’, ‘dream jobs’ and to ultimately help address concerns about professional futures. I hope that through the project, the participating children and their families learned tools and avenues to talk about their futures, possibilities and professional hopes and worries.

All scarves were made as paper mockups during a workshop, I then digitized and interpreted the designs, manufacturing the final scarfs in Germany. At the end of the residency, we held a launch event where we celebrated the scarves and handed out the scarves to their creators.

This project is an extension of the Work Scarves that I made in 2020 inspired from the language that career professionals use.