How do you express your personality? Maybe, if you are a Guilford student, it is through your dorm room. Different students decorate their rooms in different ways. How do you choose to live in the space you spend the most time in? What do you place around your living space?

“A lot of things are little gifts,” says junior Eliana Weiner. We are looking at the objects inhabiting her desk.

“That troll is from my aunt — her friend makes them,” Weiner says. “And of course all the geeky things.”

The desk is home to Disney figurines, miniscule fairies and multiple copies of the complete Lord of the Rings series.

There is a tapestry over Weiner’s window that she brought back from Hawaii during her gap year. Strung across the corner of the room are prayer flags that match the colors of the flowers on her desk.

Every part of the room has a pattern or color. Weiner’s mattress is draped in rich blankets and cushions and set on the floor next to the window. As I am admiring a reading light, Weiner points above my head. Tucked into the mattress wires of the loft above her bed are postcards and Valentine’s Day cards from friends and family.

I ask if there is anything in her room that represents the future and where she is headed.

She thinks for a moment then points to the Great Smoky Mountains map by her door.

“I want to work in the park service,” Weiner says. “And also, I like maps.”

I snap a picture of the map of the Smokies, which is hung above a map of Lord of the Rings’ Middle Earth and another of Game of Thrones’ Westeros.

Across campus, junior Aiperi Yusupova stands surveying her room. The windows are bright. A desk with two computers sits underneath a board covered with photographs and clippings. A dress form stands beside it.

“My room is a personal place, … a place where I keep my thoughts and ideas and all my work,” says Yusupova.

“It’s my workplace, for now, (for) my designer startup brand.”

If you Google Yusupova’s name, the website for her brand-name designer clothing comes up. She debuted her line at Charlotte Fashion Week last year.

“Usually during school … all I do is concentrate on studies, but once I have a break, I do (design),” she says, hanging up a few of her design sketches on the board. She explains they had been down recently because she had been doing schoolwork. The decor in her room shifts depending on her current projects.

The room is neat and organized with textbooks and novels lining the shelves by her bed.

Yusupova pulls aside the curtain to her closet, revealing an abstract painting the color of the ocean and a dream board: a collage of photographs of doctors, a world map and phrases like “training leaders in academic medicine” and “explore the world.” They all represent her future and where she is headed.

I ask Yusupova if there is anything else she wants to bring up. Immediately, she points out the view from both of her corner windows — enormous trees abound. Near one window frame, Yusupova has placed a bouquet of flowers. I snap a picture.

If you are a Guilford student, maybe your personality is expressed through your dorm room. You cannot always choose the space you live in, but you can choose how you live in it.