Fashion and jewellery collaboration - final design ideas

This project has certainly taught me that the learning process never stops. 

To name a few:

• I've realised how well we actually supported one another and were willing to compromise if one of us wasn't happy

• Bickering is always bound to happen in a group (by the end of it all, I felt like a little family, in which (despite the love) disputing is predictable but necessary

• The importance of  voicing your opinion no matter how insignificant you think it may be - because anything you say might spark off something great in someone else

• Everyone has a strength and  making sure that they all have a part to play makes for a stronger outcome 

• learn to let go of ideas (this one i found particularly challenging) 

• to always have a back-up plan. Hussa's famous phrase of the project : "Lucie, worst case scenario, we just turn to plan b..." (Hussa, Zoe and Xiosha taught me that a breath of tranquility is always a good idea - things do get tough, but never panic, just zen-up and talk it out and things will fall into place...)

They were right...

In all the chaos, stress and lack of sleep lies the beauty of our final designs…

Now for the making...

(to be continued...)

Fashion and jewellery collaboration: Another mood board for the road...

Fashion and Jewellery Collaboration: Ideas and designing

The design and ideas process was definitely one of the toughest and most difficult aspects for us. It was great that everyone had so many opinions and ways of thinking but on the other hand it also created a lot of conflict and tension amongst the group.  It wasn’t like we were all working for one fashion house/label that had one particular aesthetic; we were all different individuals with different visions and tastes.

At this point, our project was starting to overwhelm everyone as fashion felt the need to design the jewellery and jewellery also wanted to have a say in the design of the garment. 

The more and more we launched and fired ideas at each other, the more intense, energy-consuming and chaotic it became. Luckily though, our next project review was due...(I feel like they always came at just about the right time!)

The tutors wisely suggested that we make a list of the key points we were investigating in our project and wanted to convey through our pieces. We then would have to stop going round and round in circles and just take action. (We only had one week left)

We divided our list of interests and research into three main areas...Ideally, this was what we all wanted to incorporate into our final designs: 

1. Mark-making

• to document the movement through a process that is instinctive and physical  

(above: a collage made by me)

2. Movement and ritual

• to refer back to the photograph of an Iranian ritual performed by a group of men in white fluid shirts - frenetic movement, focus is placed on the head and shaking long hair back and forth

Through this we came to the idea of a head piece for our jewellery which, through movement makes marks on the garment

(above: page out of my sketchbook)

• to refer back to rituals involving mark making or pigment 
• to explore daily rituals such as getting dressed and laundry, which would influence the silhouette and film we were going to make

(above: ideas/illustrations made by our fashion group)

3. Weight

• Implicate Druid story of valuables placed in pocket and emptied as a cleansing process
• Remember that this superstition made us consider incorporating weights into the design as a way of making marks
• Consider weight in the drapes of the fabric – influencing the silhouette and shape of the garment
• Richard Deacon's sculptures – aesthetic of jewellery piece

(above: collage made by me)

(above: design idea collage by Elizabeth)

May, (the voice of reason) as well as the tutors then advised us to split off into fashion and jewellery for the afternoon and come back together the next day to discuss what we had come up with. I felt like that grouping off into our own disciplines was a really idea as it helped us to be way more productive - it was exactly what we needed.

However, despite this, by the time I got home that evening I found myself feeling anxious and unconfident. I wanted to push the boundaries with our designs. I didn’t really feel satisfied with what we had come up (even despite having made a lot of progress.) It's just so easy to play it safe…Plus, I was hoping for that one finished, spectacular idea…One which could leave me feeling certain, but we had a huge range of ideas that everyone was umm-ing and err-ing about. And when some of us are confused or unsure, I've learnt that it certainly effects the mood of the rest of the group. Then you just find yourself spending a lot of the time worrying about everyone else and checking whether they are happy or not, on top of your own feelings! 

Ah - my oh my! It's like a never-ending cycle...

That night I couldn’t sleep, which always happens when you are a little bit of a perfectionist like me. I just hoped that everyone would be confident on our final design or want it to be even better than how we were envisaging it now. Plus, not knowing how the rest of the group were getting on (or feeling) had me on edge...

(to be continued...)

Fashion and Jewellery Collaboration - Experimenting

What is it about the act of making a mark on a surface that is just so compelling? 

Many artists evidently explore the possibilities of mark-making...

For one, Rebecca Horn (a personal favourite of mine) uses her body as a site for art-making through performance. She almost exploits the entire physicality of her body by creating some outrageous and mind-blowing accessories that kind of resemble extreme hardware. 

She has invented some of the most striking drawing tools... 

My group wanted to investigate further into some non-traditional ways of mark-making and eventually set out to challenge and explore the relationship between fashion and jewellery through this process. 

We just loved the thought of a jewellery piece magically interacting with a garment,  acting as a form of documentation of bodily movement through its mark-making. 

We thought that the image below summed up our vision perfectly. 

Over the weekend we decided to all meet up and find ways of creating our own natural pigments and instruments for mark-making. Eggs, spices, chalk and food colourings were all some of the ingredients we took pleasure in using. 

Making marks as a kind of performance seemed to be a form of experimenting we were all keen and interested in. But no-one was scared to also voice their own individual fascinations of the whole process. 

It was amazing to listen to and witness the many backgrounds that the other girls came from... (e.g. Anna enjoying the performance aspect of our mark-making, Zoe the ‘fine-artist’ enjoying the painterly side of it all and Hussa intrigued in filming the process) I thus began to realise the true beauty of working with fashion or in design in general. There are just so many infinite possibilities of how your career can develop and where it can lead you. Who knows maybe one day my jewellery might be part of the catwalk... (fingers crossed!) 

Our experimenting kind of reminded us all of a ritual process with all its repetitive gestures, objects and it being taken part within a specific place.  Perhaps this could be part of a performance for our final outcome? Who knew at this stage...it was just an idea.

By this point it was time for our first progress review with the tutors. We thought that mounting our ideas onto a pin board would be an effective and clear way of trying to explain our thought-processes. In many ways my aesthetics are very clean and structured and I love helping out in any way possible, so I didn't mind taking it upon myself to make the moodboard. 

The fact that the tutors were excited by our starting point really uplifted the mood of the group - it got us that more determined and motivated to nail it. We were advised to research into rituals and existing garments as well as instruments for mark-making in terms of jewellery.

A huge part of today’s fashion, I guess, lives from the reinvention of its past. So researching into the history of it all seems essential in terms of taking the next step…. the ideas and designing of our collection. But we need to remember that we need to elaborate on the information and research we get, adding a great deal of our group personality into it and making it essentially our own. 

We looked into chalk lines as part of research for jewellery (a chalked string used in the building trades to make a straight line on a vertical surface). 

We even had a go at creating our own. We enjoyed the plucking motion of the string. It made us feel as if we were a kind of body harp. 

We were advised to experiment with adding some form of weights onto the strings and Anna (in fashion design) even took this a step further by incorporating weights within a garment, seeing whether they would have a direct effect on the silhouette of the piece or on her performance of bodily movement....

By the end of the day we had all planned to meet in the morning to discuss further ideas and designs.

So far so good in the group!

(To be continued...)

Jewellery puts on it's fashion face - Sourcing inspiration

As part of our next unit, Central Saint Martins asked our jewellery course to collaborate with fashion womenswear. 

Because fashion design was initially what I wanted to study, I was so so excited but also (admittedly) very fearful at the prospect of dealing with all the intensity that the fashion world can bring...

But I always like challenges. 

I've learnt that every challenge and experience is a good one (despite finding it VERY hard to see at first). Whether it be a disaster or success, they really will make you grow somehow, learn something new about yourself and also about the world around you.

The brief consisted of producing a series of six fully styled, dramatic and creative outfits (all incorporating some kind of jewellery piece) for a shop window of our choice to essentially promote British fashion and jewellery during London Fashion Week. 

Meet the group:

I was put into a team of  4 fashion students and 4 jewellery students and all girls might I just add! (Get the claws out...) just kidding!

Being a people person I didn't find it awkward at all introducing one another, and to my surprise everyone seemed really nice! Maybe I was just extremely lucky...(or perhaps extremely naive? It was only the first day after all...)

Having discussed and shared our individual interests and  thoughts on how we might first approach this project, we all finally decided to venture off to a couple of exhibitions for some group inspiration as well as to help to get to know each other better. 

With the Gagosian gallery just being a 5 minute walk away from our Kings Cross campus, we decided to start our journey there. Having had a little gossip and chat on the way (typical) we were all soon hit with the hugeness of Georg Baselitz' gutsy creations. 

Baselitz’s witty and unique method of training our gaze by turning his self-portraits literally ‘on their heads’ left me smiling...

I liked how it actually allowed the viewer to see each portrait as an energetic and exhilarating explosion of gestural marks rather than as a mere description of the artists face.

Yet on the downside of the upside....(and especially for a small person like me) it also left me feeling very sore after craning my neck so high as to fathom every detail of his monumental paintings. Furthermore, with the additional adoption of such an obscure upside-down orientation, it created even more of a strain, as it had my head bending at all kinds of awkward angles!

Ok, so moan and groan over now... 

What was particularly interesting, (having read a little bit of background on Baselitz) was that it was just as much about the process for him as it was the final product. Apparently he painted his canvases on the floor and even used his body as part-paintbrush! 

If you looked close enough, you could see the subtle pigment-smeared footprints or the circles of paint-pot bases sandwiched in between the more obvious toddler-like swathes, smears or the stronger more serious linear strokes.

Sometimes (ok for the majority of the time) I find myself over-thinking things and taking life a bit too seriously. So I guess it was no surprise that I found the exhibition to be ultimately, so refreshing. Baselitz’ radically loose, unintentional and spontaneous acts of mark-making gave each painting a kind of freeing quality - one which I think my whole group and I truly admired and wanted to explore further. 

After leaving the Gagosian, it was clear that 'process and mark-making' were two themes which had each member of the group excited and enthusiastic. 

But upon entering the RA's 'Sensing Spaces': Architecture re-imagined (our next stop off point), we all promised to still keep open-minded to any other theme or focus that might direct or influence our project. We had to keep telling ourselves that it was still the first day and thus it was important that we did not just dive instantly into anything we came across immediately (however thrilling it may be). 

What was truly brilliant about this exhibition was the fact that it was all interactive. It actually proved to be a great way to start off as a group as well, because it was so socially involving – a real ice breaker…

It let you walk, climb, sit, touch as you moved through the winding spaces.

Peek-a-boo

We all admired the repeated patterns of precisely measured-out wood whilst childishly giggling through each structure, feeling like we were 'kids' again…

What was amazing was to also witness the encouragement given to visitors to leave their own mark on each structure. 

We couldn't help but notice that there was a real emphasis on the directness and immediacy of human mark-making much like in the work of Baselitz. 

For example, architect Diébédo Francis Kéré allowed visitors to essentially create his architectural piece. We were allowed to insert straws into his white plastic honeycomb structure in whatever way we wanted...

The result was a somewhat shrine of colorful scribbles...

It was so exhilarating to take part in creating a piece of architecture with complete strangers.  It made the whole process that much more unexpected and unique. 

It was also a nice surprise to bump into some familiar faces as other groups coincidentally arrived at the same exhibition. Who knew that a simple bunch of plastic straws could shape a space so magnificently or even create so much laughter and enjoyment in people?

There was a sense of touch and a playful physicality to the piece here- much like Baselitz' tactile works made through bodily movement. 

Similarly, they were both so wondrously messy with colour. 

Despite having so much fun at this exhibition, it actually made me realise how you are kind of never really 'off-duty' as designers. Inspiration is everywhere and every moment of your life becomes work. But I guess I'm so lucky that I love what I do!

Furthermore, what was amazing was how ‘Sensing Spaces’ not only prompted people to gape upwards in astonishment but also encouraged people to look down and be more sensory-aware.   

We all discussed and pondered over the idea that each time you would revisit the exhibition it would become a totally different experience – it could not possibly be replicated...For example, the sounds of people in the spaces would be entirely different, the mark-making would also become more layered and more intense and the lighting of that particular day would forecast unknowingly the atmosphere of each room…

As a Virgo, organization and perfectionism (kind of) naturally run in my veins, so it was no surprise that I found myself craving to ask the group what they thought our next step should be so that we could start the project right away! We all took a seat within the architectural space and brainstormed some ideas, finalizing some key words as well as writing up a timetable of our next couple of meetings. This was only a three week project after all - and I've definitely learnt how quickly time can pass...

(To be continued...)