Image commercially licensed from: Unsplash
Proper advertisement, good communication, and effective use of technology can change lives. It always needs a better perspective to make the unseen and unrecognized things become even more valuable and desirable.
This is what Hu Yinping did for her hometown’s unseen valuable crafts and craftswomen. Hu Yinping, an artist from Sichuan, China, visited her hometown in 2015 and found a handicraft that can be easily called a diamond in the rough. Hu Yinping graduated from CAFA, where she studied sculpture and became an artist herself. Most of her work mainly focuses on life and is based on the ideas evolving from everyday life in Begin.
During her visit to her hometown, she found that women in her hometown are making these incredibly delicate and intricately beautiful handmade hats. She felt that all this crafted labor was being ignored and not getting its actual worth. She realized that this was all happening just because of the lack of proper communication and advertisement. These handicrafts were being bought at a much lower price due to the absence of proper visibility on the big markets.
Hu Yinping said her mother is a very strong independent woman who doesn’t want to be helped. But Hu had a plan. She wanted her mother and others to be self-sufficient and fully equipped to use the internet, WeChat, and other social and payment platforms to sell and advertise their handicrafts.
Hu Yinping asks her friend to play the role of Xiaofang to broker a deal with her mother and the other ladies in the trade. Her friend pretends to be a French buyer and encourages her mother to use the internet, WeChat, and express delivery for orders. With each order, her mother and her team become more and more familiar with the use of these new technologies. This trade turned this business into a company called Xiaofang’s Hat Knitting Team. And in 7 years, there were more than 50 craftswomen on the team.
Hu Yinping said that initially, all she could see was the friends and life in the town, but now there are more close people like Xiaofang in her social circle. And these people not only belong to the local area, but now her reach is International.
Hu Yinping’s second move was to promote and advertise these handicrafts worldwide. She chose WeChat, considering its worldwide reach, popularity, and diversity of users using this platform, especially in the Chinese population. Hu Yinping compared the “Xiaofang” project to a sea, and the aunts are jellyfish. She poked the jellyfish, and the jellyfish would display exaggerated gestures. And her job is to observe jellyfish and changes in the sea. As Hu Yinping describes, that jellyfish only live in this small area of the sea, but it actually causes fluctuations in the entire sea area.
Hu Yinping posted a story showcasing these beautiful handmade hats on her WeChat public account. And they become viral in a matter of minutes. Thousands of WeChat users saw that story and showed their appreciation. Hundreds of WeChat users rushed to the stores to buy these hats. This project gave these Knitting aunts self-confidence with words of encouragement and extra “bonuses” for their creative ideas.
The Knitting team aunts weaved green hats, bikini suits for the “Bikini Contest by the Sea of France” and the “family flag” that represents the spirit of women.
Now, this team of very talented women offers woolen hats and weaves bikinis, which is very delicate and intricate work. They also provide customized national flags too.
This process involves not only hard work, but an incredible amount of aesthetic sense and imagination goes in this process. The Hat Knitting team weaves imaginary weapons to attack bad guys. The amazing creativity of these small-town aunts is the reason for their popularity. And this great talent was not only ignored but was discounted due to the lack of presence and representation in proper international marketplaces. With Hu’s determination, this long-time neglected handicraft blossoms in every stitch.
This small-town business turned into a long-term social project.
In 2017, their handmade items were used by protestors in New York. The other variant of the hats in pink color were donated by Hu Yinping American public welfare organizations. Soon they became a very popular item to be visible in different parades in the USA.
This was not the end; the green hats of the aunts flew to Ireland on St Patrick’s Day as they could easily gel in with the green theme of the Irish celebration. Also, Xiaofang was invited to participate in the 4th Sino-French Cultural Forum in Nice, France. With some help and guidance, these women are now self-reliant. They can use smartphones, the internet, and social platforms such as WeChat to showcase their valuable handicrafts.
For them, these hats are not only business but also an important way to express their personality and take charge of their own life. And in changing their fate, WeChat played and still plays a very important and crucial role.
In the end, it takes only one idea and some determination to change the whole outlook toward anything. Life can be changed with one idea.
