Muse

The Muse we have selected as a  group is John Cale, we picked him based on the reading list that was present in James Long's brief. We found that John Cale's band the Velvet underground was an experimental band. He was renowned for controversy and would preform on stage with sports masks over his face. His controversy is what lead my group into pushing the idea of a punk collection that has reference to sports wear due to his masks that he wore.

From researching john Cale I was interested in the links between himself and Andy Warhol. I want the knitwear collection to have links to the pop art culture. I decided to select a vivid colour palette that reflected John Cale's prime time of his career in the 70's.

James Long Presentation by Tom

lecture with Tom

James Longs design process starts conceptually and looks at a broad range of medias for the collections starting point. The 'Devine' collection for A/W 13 was inspired by John Waters films mainly the grungy style of 'Pink Flamingo'. The brand extracted glossy and matt finish fabrics from the concept of gross, grunge style and incorporated them into the collection.

The group Tutorial with Tom was helpful because he helped the group to narrow the starting point of our concept down. We have decided to look at the 1976 Punk movement. Tom wants us to collaborate as a team on the sample to manipulate the fabrics in the experimental way that James Long's team work. He advised that we create a range of moquettes that include leather, faux fur, synthetic hair and burning fabric, foiling at painting the knitting as references to the punk fashion culture. He suggested we looked at the painted leather works Claire Barrow designs to be influenced by the rawness of her work.

Evaluation

Through this unit I have had to manage my time carefully so that I could complete both projects ready for the deadlines. I found it stimulating completing two projects at the same time because I did contrasting projects, however I found that the concepts and techniques I used progressed and adapted between the two briefs. I split my time in a way that I gave priority to my ‘branding’ brief for initial knitting time and focused on both sketch books through out. I think that this management worked successfully for me because I like to be devoted to the sampling as though is a mind map of ideas.

The branding brief gave me the perimeters of styles to design the samples. I was very focused on the brand identity and style so my research directly informed my knitting because I adapted design ideas that the brand had already done but I was able to adjust the design in my own creative way.

I found that the time limit on the ‘Branding’ brief made the project fast paced so I needed to be critically selective over which ideas and visual research I’d unpick my yarn ideas and knitting compositions from. This was because I wanted my samples to work well as a collection. I didn’t have a lot of time to make a collection of development sample. My limited colour palette made me focus on the knitting skills I used. I found that the charcoal a pen drawing informed the yarn qualities that I selected, because of this I think there is a clear correlation between the visual research and the knit samples.

My ‘In the moment’ brief focused on creating edges and combining different weights of yarn to manipulate the way that the garments hung. The designers research I based my samples on were predominantly not knitwear. I wanted my collection to be a response to the colour and structure trends of garments on the catwalk for Spring 15.  I think that my samples have reflected the concept of 'In the moment' by the combinations of techniques used in each sample. I think that all of the samples have an effect of temporariness through the choices of yarns I used.

McQueen suptersitions Yarn Qualities

My colour palette has been limited to monochrome because of my theme of magpies. I wanted to find a colour that could break up the black. I looked at images of magpies wings which I did colour studies from. I decided that a teal would give a small point of interest if it could be placed in the samples discretely in a mohair or chenille because of their feather like features. The chenille has a subtle shine and the mohair yarn could blend with the yarns around it.

Symmetry is a key trait of Alexander McQueen designs. I decided to manipulate my drawings of Photoshop. I repeated and reflected the drawings and used them as silhouettes which helped me to identify the negative space shapes. I created a range of compositions that I later made a punch card from. 

I am pleased with the effect of the punch card design. I used a Mohair yarn with a fine cotton, both in black. The fine yarn showed the mohair floats behind it which gave a similar depth to the layered drawings I have done. This lace quality is enhanced and lifted with the introduction of teal mohair. 

The punch card design is an abstract from the negative space from one of my drawings. Alexander McQueen used jaquard designs that give a more illustrated design,  however I don't have the facilities to do that so I thought I would focus on the symmetry in the design.
This sample is based on the PhotoShop edit of the orginal shape.

McQueen Suptersition Lacey Qualities

I want the effect of my pen scribbly line contrasted with charcoal drawings to be interpreted in the sampling. When I started knitting I wanted to use techniques that made the fabric denser so that I could contrast it with a lace hole row or a stitch that would open up the knitting so that it has a tight then lose effect. I found that a tuck punch card with lace holes gave that structure.

 

From looking at the spring/summer 15 collection by Alexander McQueen, I found that i liked the affect of the lace pannels in the dress show above. The elongated stitch with the mohair yarn gave a very hairy bouniant texture that I had wanted to achieve in relation to the Magpie imagery I had found. I think this sample would make interesting shoulder pannels in a garment. To improve this sample I would inclued more variations of the size of the elongated stich bumps. I would keep th edesign symetrical and formulatic though to stay in keeping with the brand.

 

 

 

These designs by Alexander McQueen have very lacey yet structural qualities.I wanted to create some sample that had the scribbly textures of my drawings. I think this was achieved by using a variable yarn that I used in an elongated stitch. I also hooked up singular stiches to give the plain knit a surface texture. My colour palette is so limited that it needs lots of variety in texture to give the affect of different tones.

McQueen Superstition research

For the live brief I am going to create a range of samples for Alexander Mcqueen’s AW 15 women’s wear collection.

From looking into the concepts of previous mcqueen collections. I decided to base my collection on magpies and the superstitions and stigmas behind them. From the research on mcqueen a collection I wanted to consider symmetry in the houses designs. I interpreted this I'm My drawings through the use of reflection repeat drawings however I wanted to contrast the drawings with different weights of mark making.


I found this image of a magpie on Pinterest. I am interested in the composition and pose of the magpie in the image. I feel that the contrast of smooth and ruffled link well to Mcqueen's couture collection for A/W 15. I want to create a range of samples that capture the affect of that magpie image. I am interested in the way that Mcqueen haut couture garments often have a more accentuated larger texture at the bottom of the deigns. I want to translate that fashion house style into the samples I create, with this image as my main source of information.

‘Buoyant and light, while still maintaining a strong sense of structure, ethereal and ghostly’. vogue. This description of the A/W 14 I feel is a design trait I should inhabit for my collection of samples. 

 

I repeated my drawing of a magpie to explore possinle knit techniques and texture I could use. the drawing had light and dense shifts throughout it with I felt would translate well into textured yarns with a heavy tuck combined with lace holes. To improve this sample I feel it would give a more contrasted affect if there was a few links of a metalic blue that would resemble the texture quaulities of a magpies wing feather.

Week 8

My collection of samples were starting to look to beige. I needed to introduce some colour into them to freshen the tones and add diversity to the collection. I looked back at the bubble shadow imagery for colour inspiration and decided to introduce the blue tone as discreetly as it appears in the imagery. This sample could be improved by shifting the yarn tones behind the floats to make the knitting look 3D. This would give the sample a buoyant affect to the bottom.

This Sample has the movement affect the PhotoShop edited imagery has. I varied the yarn weight to make the structure seem although it is fading away. The blue tone contrasts the darker yarn, this gives the sample a clearer transitional fade up the sample. I would have bee able to achieve this affect if I had stayed with the all beige colour palette.

As a way to contrast all of the samples in the collection, I knitted this sample using the colour that I had only previously used in some amounts. The collection is all very similar so 'i feel it needed a contrasting piece to freshen the palette of the collection. The fine yarn on the chunky machine gives the affect that the bubble clusters did. With more time I would have experimented with transfering and manipulating the same yarn between the domestic knitting machine and the chunky. I would be interested to see how the fabric would hang using those ideas.

ChiaShan Lee's knitwear has the edge quailites that I have being focusing on. The structure of the 

knitting is replicated through the garment but through different techniques. The way the garment

appears makes the knitting is collapsing between the two denser parts of the garment.