Making Her...

I've finally finished my skirt and I must say I'm pleased with the finally outcome. 

Making the skirt I came across many difficulties which mainly was about the weaving part. Trying to calculate how many stripes of fabric I'll need to weave with so I can produce the right length and width with it. Weaving was also very time consuming as I had to weave and pin it in place in order to create a fum weave. 

( Authors own 24/10/21014)

Due to time I decided not to turn each stripe inside out to conceal the stitching so it took me longer to weave as I had to conceal the stitching as I went alone. However weighing up the time, it would of took longer to turn each stripe inside out and the iron it because of the thickness and length of each one. Although this was the hardest and most time consuming part and really like the outcome of it and the different shades make it look print like. After weaving half the side of the skirt I realised I was running out of fabric so rather that having the weaving all the way round I just have it at the front. 

Second place for the most time consuming technique was the cutting out circular pieces out of the chiffon fabric and hand stitching and machine stitching each piece to the bottom of the fabric. I did this to add texture to the design.    

( Authors own 24/10/2014)

After cutting out the back piece of the skirt and pinned all my pieces together to see if I was going to add or change anything. 

( Authors own 24/10/2014)

Smooth Like Cotton

Today I took a trip to shepherd's bush market looking for fabric to make my final design. 

After going though initial ideas and development I decided on a woven high waist skirt with hand draping at the bottom.  

Initial I was looking for a thick jersey fabric for the woven part. I went to a range of shops and couldn't find a range of shades of green to my liking. After searching further looking at other fabrics and decided on getting half a meter of three different shades of green in 100% cotton & half a meter in other shade of green in satin cotton for contrast. I knew I wanted chiffon for the draping as it drapes well. I decided on buying two meters as I knew I'll be using at least a quarter of it for added detailing on top. 

All together u spent under £20 which I think was really reasonable and I can't wait to start making. 

Photoshoot Day

Today was the day I decided to shoot my accessory photo shoot. I had created a strong concept board and I was confident with my concept.

Since my belt has a very strong tribal and/or tropical look to it I wanted to create a juxtaposition with my photo shoot. When researching I realised how in the fashion world it seems like designers like to put black models ( especially those withe darker skin tones) in African wear but not in clean cut clothes such as a tuxedo. Not only this but tuxedo's are normally worn by men so having a female wear it makes a huge statement supporting the idea of feminism. I also wanted to place this in somewhere which looks wild with organic growth around.

I bough in all my props and clothing and set off to shot. I decided to go for a trouser with a skinny fit and no shirt to add a sexy twist to the manly style and went for classic black converses just to throw everything off. I found some nice areas around uni and with the help of Daisy who took the pictures while I model we got some great shots. After going through all my photos I took some of my favorites and started playing around with them on Photoshop.

What i found difficult was working on Photoshop as my Photoshop skills are very basic so it took a lot of experimenting to get what I wanted, but I am very pleased with the final outcome and I enjoyed the day. Although this is not my strongest skill I think it was great for me to do this as a way of building my skill level. I think next time if I was to do this photo shoot again with the same concept I would go try taking the shoots withe a clean cut white back ground or maybe on a tube. 

( Authors own 10/10/2014)

West End Vs Wind And Rain

Today we took a trip to west end to do some interpendent resreach, looking at other desginers, stores, fabrics, trends and street styles.

I went to a range of stores such as Topshop, Selfriges and Liberty trying to get as much information as possible, collecting business and asking questions to help me with the development of my book. I really enjoyed my day butIi would not stay it was the most successful day I've had. We met at 10:30am to get signed in and had to be back for 3:00pm to sign in again. I felt like the time given was very short as west end is such a big place. Not only this it's very easy to get  lost or distracted and take a shopping trip rather than sticking to researching. To make it worse the weather was terrible with strong wind and rain so it made it even harder to get to places. I would stay the most successful part of today was visiting the photographers gallery where I took some photos and also going to Liberty where I was able to place orders for about six samples which I should receive in 3-4 days. Aside from that I feel like the day was unproductive and the task should of been given earlier as the research would of been more viable.

Accessory Workshop : Weave It

Today using the workshops on Monday, Wednesday and the developments in my book I had to make my accessory.

I had the whole day to complete my accessory and I started by laying out all the tools and objects I had and also went through my book looking at my developments and theme. Once I did this completing the task was no trouble at all because I kind of had a basic plan and idea in my head so I knew the direction I was heading in. I was able to finish my accessory on the day but was worried at the fact I used leaves to weave and since the leaves have been cut of from the root after a while the leaves will start to die, shrivel up and change colour. This will be a problem because I'm planning on shooting my fashion photo of my accessory on the following Friday. If I was to create this again I would have to create the woven belt closer to the photo shoot day in order to try and preserve as much of the colour and health of the plant as possible.

( Authors own 03/10/2014)

( Authors own 03/10/2014)

I think the weaving was very successful as I've done a lot of weaving in my book and it has become a common theme subconsciously. I've done it so many times I've become a pro and I really like the finished effect. One thing I didn't like was that because the leaves where all different lengths and thickness the ends of the leaves are left out. I was planning on cutting the edges off at the end but I then realised this will make the weaving loose, then I thought to go back in and try and tuck it into open sections but that interfered with the overall look of the weaving. So I decided on keeping the ends on just for the meantime but after placing it on the mannequin I liked the ruff and roughed look it gave so I kept it. It was very challenging working with the wire as it was very stiff, hard to cut and kept cutting me once cut, but after a while I got use to it and found a way to ensure I didn't cut myself.  

I feel like my final accessory is ambiguous which I really like about it. This is because it opens up the creative mind of the wearer to decided what the object is. I created it to be a belt but many thought it was other things such as a headdress and started to try it on in different ways to try and work out what it actually was, until I came over and said "it's a belt" and I got that generic answer of "ohhhhhh". The fact that it can be seen as multiple thinks is what I think is most successful about it.