Fashion Collaboration

I have to admit, going into this project, I was very skeptical. Having to fill a box with idea's for fashion and textiles in 2036, wasn't really sounding like my cup of tea. The brief was so vague and then in tutorials we were all being told completely different things - everyone was very confused. Would it be marked? Would it not? Nobody knew, and it kind of just seemed like toy day in primary school, a little end of the year fun; which is not what everyone wanted when they were trying to get a proposal written and finish off any other loose ends. I just don't think many of us were that excited about this very short collaboration.

Saying that however, it actually turned out to be a lot of fun. I found it quite difficult work with the fashion students as they did have a lot of other stuff on, so it ended up being myself and Laura (my new partner in crime) doing a lot of work by ourselves and then bringing it back to the fashion girls and seeing what they thought.

I wrote out the context, in 20 years time the ice caps are melting at an exponential rate and it was time to act! The Amphibious Age was coming, and the human race had to adapt. A little far fetched I know, but the brief did say we could do anything! In the end, when we were all the groups presented their ideas, it seemed that no-one had designed for a happy future - the next 20 years are looking bleak!

I had so much fun working with Laura, we melted plastic bottles between PVC and then used sublimation printing on the top of this to act as an underwater camouflaged armour, that is also making use of all the plastic that is being endlessly dumped into the ocean - that's what we were going for anyway, haha!

I would like a chance to collaborate with other courses again, just maybe for a little  longer (two weeks seemed very rushed, especially when everyone had so much other stuff on). 

Putting together the final collection

Putting together our final collection was really fun. I'm so happy with what we were able to produce as a group, I think we all did really well! We didn't achieve everything that we set out to, but we had a good try! We were working on fabrics and surfaces that I would have never thought of working on before - this project has really opened my eyes and working with the other girls was a great opportunity. I'm so proud of what we managed to accomplish in the four weeks.

here is a link to the video that we made as part of the final collection also: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=yJGu1L_s7uw

The Gym

 In the first week of the project, myself and Marie visited Style Gym (we discovered that one of our print technicians also works here, so she put us in contact). We took photos to the put our designs into context later, and to see what sort of space / surface they would fit into. Here are my context designs.

Photoshop work

I've been working digitally a lot for this project, as we have then been using the sublimation printer to transfer the images onto neoprene and other sports fabrics. I've had a lot of fun doing this, I struggled at first, working onto a dark background is something I would normally do, but I produced some things that I feel really fit the brief in the end. 

Glow Sticks!

After a tutorial with Kit, we realised that the colour palette on our mood boards did not match the colours that we had been working with on the cork in the print room. Our boards were very dark, whereas the tiles were more day glow, very light and airy. That's not what we were going for. Myself and Emily went into one of the spare studios and played around with glowsticks for a while - such a great way to spend the afternoon! The way light can be captured amazes me, you can feel the movement in the photographs which is what we were going for. I will then be working with these in photoshop to come up with some designs for the sports club brief! hopefully these will fit our original colour palette a lot more.

Working together in the Print Room

After each preparing some screens, we then took to working onto cork tiles with opaque binders. I'd never used either of these materials before, but I would like to use the binder a lot more in the future, when printing. We were working with the idea of working with a sustainable and soft surface that can be used on the walls and floors of the gym and also be easily replaceable if they became damaged.

Initial Ideas

After the first meeting we had, our tutor mentioned that we had a lot going on and it was unclear what our goal was - we decided to refine it down a little more and just focus on drawing from architecture and playing with light for the time being. One thing that we thought would fit quite well was photographing and filming glow sticks - the colours were neon just like we wanted, adidas use a lot of light in their stores and in their adverts. Plus, who doesn't love messing around with glow sticks? It definitely made for a fun afternoon!

Group Project: TEAM ADIDAS

At the start of BA2b we were given a new brief in which were put into teams and given a brief from a selection of companies; they ranged from designing a new look for the interiors of Stagecoach buses to working towards an interiors range for Comme De Garcon, an avant garde fashion line.

My group was given a brief from Adidas (just pretend but you know) to design a range of innovative fabrics for the interiors of a new sports club. Coming into it, I was really excited - I was getting to work with three other girls that I'd never worked with before, but I knew that they were all hard working and dedicated. After the last group project at the start of second year, I had been quite wary when I found out we were doing another one this term too - I didn't really have the best group last time. It was reassuring to know I was working with people that I knew would also be putting the effort in. We started brainstorming straight away - thinking about what we thought of when we thought of the brand and what we normally see in their adverts and on their social media. 

At first we wrote down all of our ideas and realised we would have to really zone in on just a few... After all, we only have 4 weeks! We decided in the end to create work inspired by modern architecture with quite an industrial, geometric feel to it - using neon / glow in the dark schemes, using ideas of light and movement also. Here are my first few mood boards for the project.