Day 1: Fashion & Textiles

In the beginning of day 1 of fashion and textiles we had a brief talk about what we will be doing today and explore the relationship between structure, pattern and fashion. We will explore our ideas through paper manipulation and disregard the idea of something wearable and fashion overall.

The morning portion we created our starting points from structure, font or texture and create five different samples to choose from for the future activity.

I found an advert that had a animated butterfly character and I was interested by the pattern on the wings and I thought it would be a good start to use for paper manipulation. I used a random page of the newspaper and with my scalpel knife and safety matt, I mimiced the pattern and enlarged it slightly. At this point I was strangely excited on what I might encounter to create multiples of samples and work out of my comfort zone.

I liked using newspaper as a meduim because it was easy to manipluate and all newspapers have different articles, gossip and news daily and so there is mixture of type and images to it. The first image shows a newspaper flower by creating two hexagon newspapers, layering on top of each other and twisting the middle to create flowing petals and amazing folds. Flowers is always used in fashion and I thought it'll be appropriate to include. The second image shows two double spread newspaper scrunched up and connected to the bottom, it creates texture by the intentional folds and creases. To be honest I was letting my imagination take over and mostly looked at structure and texture.

Here is more experimentations with newspaper, I somehow created a fan and some tassles by ripping strips of newspaper.

For the bow I stuff scrunched up newspaper as volume into two double spread pages and I secured the edges with staples. To complete the look I scrunched up a newspaper to the middle to create the complete bow, I liked this piecer because the scale was huge and so I would think it'll be good to play with, also the detailing of wrinkles and creases at the middle.

Learning that newspaper is very flimsy and hard to control I moved onto coloured paper which can add colour and structure aspect to my samples, I used a orange coloured paper and created simple creases to make 3D texture that has volume and 'pop out', it is the few steps before creating a paper swan. I didn't want to make a swan because it is time consuming since it is important to make the swan look nice, but this steps is simple and doesn't have to be neat. I personally like the simplicity of this sample and it's able to bulid on and create a simple or a overpowering piece.

This origami is the early steps before creating a paper box (which I created after this sample) I thought creating two samples for one object is sensible as it shows the change of two looks by folding and manipulating the paper, the early steps has some flimsy areas but still holds the sharp structured shape I made by creasing it.

This is the paper box origami I made for one of my samples, I learnt this from a Summer Scheme as a little child and ever since I've been amazed how paper can be 3D with a few folds and creases to use for guidelines, geometric shapes likes squares has been used in endless ways and I thought that working something 3D will be a challenge and an eye opener when mixed with fashion.

Soon after I experimented with brown paper which was much thicker than normal paper and newspaper, I feel as though it will hold shapes and structure better. I ripped different sizes of brown paper and arranged it like fish scales, layering on top of each other and reveal and concealing some areas. It reminds me of dripping paint and when a wave collides with sand, creating a rippled effect.

 All my samples laid out onto A1 paper

After completing our samples I had to select one I will use to make a series of twenty small samples to use for the next activity. I chosen my origami with brown paper because it's my personally favourite and brown paper held the structure very well.

At this time I was very tired and exhausted from cutting the brown paper and creasing it to create the shape and volume in the origami, I made fourty origami since I attached a small and big piece together to add differences of volume and infused the different size together. I used a stapler to attach two origamis together. Overall I am pleased with the outcome and it came out just the way I envisioned it.

After completing all twenty samples, we went into groups of two to three, we had to bring our samples and have a mannequin per group, we left our own samples with the mannequins and come along with our groups to three mannequins clockwise. We had to work with other people's creations and create garmets, structures etc. It was my first time working with other people's work and so I was hesitate to start getting involved but it's a new experience that I enjoy as well as working with new people. The first piece was random and so my group took advantage of the samples to create an eye catching garmet with loads of texture and movement.

{front - back - close up of back}

Random - The back is the main focus as it droops down to expose extra skin and I can imagine how flowly it'll be if someone worn it and done a cat walk. After finishing the first piece I was surprised how interesting it was since I never used a mannwquin before (although I did A level Textiles)

Minimal - Again we rotated with our groups three steps and the word that we had to reflect was 'minimal' and so for our second piece we used minimal materials to cover womanly assets to kind of show the simplicity of the art of woman's natural body structure and maybe covering parts that can cause controversy.

Statement - On our third mannequin we wanted to make a statement on the neck and shoulder with the pyramid paper structure, the structure has the elements of shape and volume and so it would be great to tone down the rest of the mannequin. The circular samples was attached onto the bottom rim of the mannequin because it could be overpowering if it was paired up with the pyramid pieces. The small black pieces is on the front and the large white pieces is on the back, creating a hi-low structure.

Focus - For the word 'focus' we wanted to pick an area of the body to apply the samples we encountered, we chosen a shoulder piece and created a dymanic yet flowing piece at the same time, it has a range of colour and how two different textures work well together, I like the sizing of the piece and how it flows to the other shoulder.

Volume - We created volume with our materials which was mostly cardboard, I thought it will be easy to create volume because it's strong and sturdy however pinning it onto the mannequin was very difficult and so we had to be careful when attaching the cardboard, our idea was to place the cardboard horizontally and add layers to give support. 

Own sample #1 - At the end we went back to our own samples and now creating something with them, my sample was used as a X formation chest piece that stopped at the waist line, and fan samples from Charlotte attached on both sides of the mannequins. This piece is symmertrical which I liked and it has two different elements of textures that I think worked well.

Own sample #2 - We used Ellen's samples and she mostly looked at a tube/cylinder structure with a letter but different typography repeated over and over, we done a minimal yet controversial outfit with a shirt, chocker and two paper to censor the boobs. I never thought of creating controversial outfits before and made me think about the limitations of fashions and some designers that don't care about how their garmets but sparks interest and makes a statement.