Bloom Club
Bloom Club is an inclusive student community at Emily Carr University, dedicated to challenging prejudicial attitudes and dismantling societal structures that perpetuate menstrual taboos and stigma.
Welcoming individuals of all genders, this club provides a safe space for menstruators and non-menstruators to unite, exchange experiences, and cultivate mutual understanding and allyship through the sharing of lived experiences and insights in a communal setting.
Members engage in participatory creative workshops, including pin-badge creation, zine-making, and designing embroidered patches, and stickers. These activities serve as avenues for members to share lived menstrual experiences and knowledge, creating a platform for open discussions. Additionally, the club hosts film screenings, seminars by medical experts, quiz-style games, and storytelling circles, exploring diverse sensorial aspects of menstruation.
Button-making Workshop
This workshop aims to provide a low-fidelity engagement activity for participants to express their thoughts and feelings about menstruation through the hands-on act of designing and making pin badge buttons.
The session begins with the distribution of name tags, facilitating ice-breaking, and a concise welcome address emphasising the club as a safe and respectful space for learning and interacting. Underscoring the club’s commitment to privacy, members are discouraged from sharing others’ stories and experiences outside of the club space. Members begin by introducing themselves to the group. Following the introductions, the facilitator begins by explaining the workshop activity to the group.
The event is equipped with two button machines of small and medium size. Printed button templates for both machines along with blank sheets of paper and multiple art supplies, are supplied to participants, allowing them to record and test their ideas before translating them onto the button templates by hand.
Each participant is equipped with a prompt/activity card designed to guide them in adopting a persona with a distinct menstrual identity. The cards provide options for choosing the tone of voice and messaging style, facilitating focused creation and the development of a clear and distinctive message in their designs. This deliberate approach also encourages non-menstruating members to consider and express themselves from the point of view of menstruators. The workshop further incorporates visual cue cards related to menstruation to inspire ideas.
While the participants fill out the activity cards, the facilitator initiates a group discussion on the prompts , moving from one participant to the other. The conversation continues as participants work on their button designs informed by their answers to the prompt cards.
The event is supplied with snacks and refreshments for participants and facilitators. At the end of the session, participants leave with their created buttons and are handed out branded Bloom Club merchandise like stickers, pin buttons, and bookmarks.
Zine-making Workshop
This activity provides a platform for participants to visually explore menstruation-related practices, challenges, and support strategies. It is designed to unearth various menstruation challenges by way of a tangible artefact as a means of bringing attention to these issues without the barrier of language and complex medical terminology.
The workshop’s main activity involves zine-making through collaging, using magazines, embroidery, drawing, and writing in response to prompt cards. In doing so, it encourages participants to utilise their hands as intuitive tools of expression in creating a more permanent record of their thoughts and experiences.
Structured similarly to the button-making workshop, participants receive activity cards with dual prompts catering to both menstruators and non-menstruators. The prompts encourage menstruators to visualise “wellness” in the context of their menstrual cycles and prompt non-menstruators to imagine what “care” and “support” should be for menstruators in their lives. The reverse side of the card invites menstruators to visualise their significant challenges in achieving menstrual wellness, while non-menstruators are prompted to envision their primary hurdles in providing better care and support to menstruators. These prompts aim to elicit participants’ visualisations of their responses to the questions, utilising visuals as a medium to capture nuanced experiences that might not be as effectively conveyed through words alone.
The overarching purpose of this workshop extends beyond the creative process. It aims to identify community concerns, paving the way for potential interventions such as inviting a medical expert or revealing internal resources and support strategies to address these issues collectively.
Through its artistic approach, it seeks to amplify the voices and experiences within the Bloom Club community, fostering a collaborative and supportive environment for dialogue and action on menstrual health and wellness.
8 Page Zine Folding Tutorial - https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=3L4ctE3ZK_k
