Brief : Looking at architecture and Fashion .
Initially this project made me extremely excited. Architecture is something I’m really drawn to and wanted to explore more of. However the idea of creating a garment out of fabric really wasn’t something I wanted to do. To get me started I looked up various buildings and textures rather than fashion garments to give me a bit of inspiration as to where I wanted to take the project. I found I was drawn immediately to geometric shapes and buildings with a lot of angles so thought maybe that would be something I considered when designing. As for the fashion part, rather than studying garments I looked more at marks created that could be used on a garment.
To get a feel for this I started practising small sample prints with a silk screen and was really happy with the outcomes and though it could be something I wanted to take further into my own designs. As I started researching and experimenting more I found I really loved the idea of containing a ‘mess ‘, I like the fact I could have a really crazy background contained by strong angles and geometric imagery and by doing this I would be combining the strong structured buildings with textures and marks found or created for a surface . As I wasn’t certain as to where I wanted to take my idea I started experimenting with inks and different materials. I wanted to focus on getting a material that would make the inks bleed into each other so looked at using tissues , a sheer fabric (which I didn’t like the colour was too weak and material too soft for what I wanted to achieve) I also inked up paper and printed on lino .
I started to manipulate some of my designs and ideas onto fashion garments just to see how it would feel and look and even though I liked how a few of the designs looked I knew I didn’t want to make a garment and was now thinking more interiors than fashion . Because I wanted to contain the mess of a bleed inky background I had a screen made up of lots of tiny triangle which I later used to print over the top of my messy background. Immediately after seeing the result of the print I thought it would look really interesting as a wallpaper or bedding so looked to blow up my design and print big.
To visualize what I was thinking I found various interiors I was drawn to and inserted my on prints into the designs to show what I was thinking . I wanted to also include this idea of layering different materials so with my final piece I printed onto acetate and inserted tiny triangular cut outs of it into my wallpaper to give it a three dimensional feel to it . If I were to create my final piece again id l like to have stretched the paper flat rather than on a wall as it was a lot harder to make the inks bleed and instead they tended to drip creating a different effect . I also think I could have used a few more darker colours on my background as the white overprint wasn’t so viable on the lighter areas of the wall paper. Overall I think the project has been successful and let me explore a lot of ideas in a short space of time .
