Inspirations behind the Project

While the What I See Project has Edwina's experiences and interests at its heart, we have also been inspired by a range of different sources. The project has been shaped by various women from all walks of life and so we cannot provide a complete list of our thought contributors and inspirations, however, below we've highlighted some of the other projects out there that really got us thinking and shaped the development of the Project:

Life in a Day

Life In A Day is a beautiful film that was executive produced by Ridley Scott and directed by Kevin Macdonald and filmed in a single day, by you! A beautiful concept - in which people all over the world filmed their lives on 24 July 2010, submitted it to YouTube and then it was edited together into a single story. It magically captures the differences and similarities of people all over the world – which mirrors what our project is already revealing.

7 billion Others

This is a project by the artist Yann Arthus-Bertrand, in which they filmed people from all over the world answering the same questions - to show what unites us, links us and differentiates us. Conceptually this was, of course, a very important inspiration for us.

Suzanne Lacy: The Crystal Quilt

'The Crystal Quilt' is an artwork by Suzanne Lacy in which hundreds of older women gathered in Minneapolis to share their views on growing older. It's an eye-opening piece by the pioneering Lacy, who throughout her career as an activist artist, writer and teacher has pushed the boundaries of how we perceive the world..

TED

TED has become world famous for its talks and online sharing. We drew inspiration from much of their functionality: tiled content that people can share, engage and interact with in a very user friendly way.

Social networks – in general

Seeing how people  on blogs, facebook, twitter and youtube has been a catalyst for a lot of our thoughts: to see how passionate people are about different areas in life, how eager they are to communicate them to the rest of the world and how positive and inspired people’s reactions can be.

But as we said, this short list doesn't cover the countless inspirational women who we've talked to - scientists, artists, politicians, musicians, working mothers, business women, students.... the list is endless. And we continued to be inspired - especially by those stories that have been shared with us already through the site and at our events. They are undoubtedly what make the Project.