Some Recent Drawings

I recently came across this scarf which i loved...

I thought it would be great for a design direction for a set of two of my scarf designs so i drew a couple of black and white flowers to go along with my bugs and other flowers to start designing my scarves.

I think they will work great and i love the texture and detail in them :)

I also drew a few more flowers and organic forms and another insect with a different shape to it so i have a few different styles to put together as a composition so i drew it with one wing closed :)

Looking who's out there

Whilst researching and looking for contacts and other artists i came across all my exhibition and show guides from places i had visited I found a designer called Lindsay Howarth Pash, she created design work and a dress during her degree and has continued to design and also produce jewellery and fashion accessories. She produces scarves which are beautiful, here are some images of her work

She says on her blog,

"My collection of womenswear scarves has gone down a storm! These individual prints tell their own story and often feature romantic ideas of escaping into a secret world of undiscovered characters. inspired by fairy tales of the past. Concentrating on our early dreams and imagination and how it fades as we understand the true meaning behind tales and fables. 

100% silk, hand painted and digitally printed one-off silk scarves are part of a unique on-of-a-kind collection which invites you to escape into a fairy tale of your own and discover the naturelab trappings which lay within."

Check it out- Lindsey Howarth Pash

Hermione De Paula

Whilst searching for scarves on Liberty's website i came across a few designs of scarves that i really liked, i noticed they was all by the same designer so i googled her to find out more about her and what she did... i was not expecting to find what i did. I started to browse her fashion range which i just absolutely loved!.. her fashion prints were to die for i loved them! They are just what i visioned my work to be and i was so inspired by her fashion prints it made me want to make mine even better haha :) Heres some images of her work.

Embroidered garment pieces with beads and ostrich feathers - wow!

Unusual floral prints with a twist is a signature design for Hermione De Paula

 This last image is my favourite, it reminds me of my last semester designs, i love the colour and structure she has used. i just think there FAB!!

Inspiration

As i started researching scarves to inspire me and look at their colours and design structure i didn't realise just how many scarves where square - nearly every designer scarf was square which i didn't really liked as i don't like how they hang on the body, i much prefered the long scarf as i love how it can be worn so differently and draped around the neck - so i was very glad i went with this shape and size for my designs.

I loved the look of flowing silk digitally printed scarves i just think there beautiful!

    

Looking at different styles and borders, colours and filters used on scarves. Looking at liberties, selfirdges, hermes all the top end of the market stores and designer scarves. Seeing what is out there and their quality and price range is really important to know where my designs fit into the market.

I also found a website which holds design competitions reagually for designers or artists to design scarves which they will go on to sell, they had a huge archive of past entry's that you can look through, it was really great to see all the different styles, shapes and designs and colours used by different artists and designers. helped me realise how i wasn't pushing my designs enough. Heres just a few of some entries

I have been looking at different ways and ideas on how to display my scarves for my final show.

I like them on the mannequin and hung, however it does not show off the design of the scarf so i would like mine to be displayed full length on the wall, flowing down to show my surface design and pattern off :)

I love how these have been displayed and would be a great idea for me if i produced enough, however i don't think it will work with just  but you never know :) worth a try!

Making a start

As i still feel pretty much behind on my drawing and visual research side i still felt it best that i made a start on designing so i started with my scarves. I showed a few to my tutors but as i did them quite quick and not really thinking about structure or design most of them were not good enough but one of my designs was really different and interesting so we used this as a starting point to move on and develop more designs. I decided to have 6 in my final collection, two in the style of my first design and 2 in a growing organic twisting spiral like design and 2 with my beautiful detailed images of bugs and insects with a different structure as the other four.

This was my first successful design, so i will be designing a 'friend' to go along with this design.

A few of my other designs i have been working on and showing different colour ways.

I love the style of this design with it feeling like its growing and flowing through the scarf, i also love the colours and will be keeping this style and colour for my second design to go along side this

Playing about with design structure, border ideas and colour ways

A second design to be a friend of my growing organic scarf design but the colours would need changing in order to be a friend with my other design as they don't match at the moment.

With spending a whole day designing and still feeling like they could be better and they are not showing off my drawing and designing skills as much as id like i headed to the library for some inspiration

Busy Bee!

Hi, Sorry i haven't updated in a while been so so busy!.. Catching up with drawing as well as sampling and putting together a few design ideas for my scarves! Its time now we need to be preparing to start printing and making our final products and i'm still drawing and only just started to design.

I recently went to visit Fred Aldous in Manchester which is a huge shop and studio with different facilities for the public to use. I went to learn how to laser cut and see how fast it was and what the outcome would be like.  They showed us examples of different types of cutting on different materials.

However my file i had prepared didn't work, and i had so many things on my hard drive when i plugged it into the laptop it just went crazy and couldn't handle my hard drive . So i ended up just testing my fabrics to see how it worked and what it looked like on my leather fabrics.  I just cut small circles but it was quite fast and gave a great outcome which never frayed. it helped me gain an understanding of how to correctly prepare my files and what it would turn out like. Heres an image of my fabric cut outs. 

However Becky's image worked and looked great once finished 

Laser cutter in the middle of cutting Becky's Doile design

It was a great experience to see and learn how it all works however it is so expensive so if i decide to use laser cutting in my final show which I'm pretty much sure i will be doing i need to work out if i have the money to pay for it or the time to cut it out myself if not as its very time consuming.

I spent a day experimenting with other metallic leather fabrics cutting out and screen printing over

I also took a trip to the NEC wedding Fayre which was not for my research initially but it did give me a few good ideas. This wedding dress had beautifully cut out and embelished detail which i would like to try on some of my samples but develop it to make it more contemporary as this seemed quite vintage and old fashioned with the style of the dress. 

Also at the end of the fashion show the final dress was a beautiful haute couture dress but everyone was taken by surprise from the over the top wedding hat, it gave me the idea to have bug heads on my mannequins for my final show or even just floating above my final garment.

The picture doesnt really do it any justice as i only had my mobile but it was beautiful and eye catching.

So on my day off me and my boyfriend had a productive day creating insect heads with paper mache

they are still nowhere near finished as i have to do layer after layer whilst letting them dry so i will upload some images later on.

I also entered the Bradford Textile Society competition with two entry's, one of repeat fabric for fashion and one with a digital print with embellishment over. I really loved my embellished sample and it made me want to embellish my final scarves once printed - if i have time which i hope i do :)

Heres images of my final boards, one being an idea board and then my main sample

Two more drawing designs of mine which i managed to slip in my hectic schedule experimenting with bugs and flowers combined and also organic flowers and forms.

 I am currently working on my final scarf designs which i will upload later

Creating new visual material

Whilst spending so long int he print room i have fallen behind a bit on the drawing side and development of patterns and designs. So i am trying my best to catch up and create a new collection of really detailed insects and flowers. I have bought three new books of amazon to inspire me to get cracking haha :) Heres two i have completed so far...

I Love the detail, texture and colours in my insects i have drew, who new insects could be so beautiful :)