Unit X | Final Collection

Our presentation to Tom went well last week, and the main point to improve on was the presentation of the samples, and to provide pictures of the knits as they are too complicated to draw. We were really happy with the feedback we got from him and the other groups.

Now that the group work is done we had a week to focus on our individual projects. We have continued to work together in the studio to help each other out until the deadline. Me and Pipp have been taking advice from Nicole on things we haven't had to do before, like garment flats, breakdowns of each design and other things we need to create a final collection file. I'm glad we have had this unit to learn things that are needed to design for the fashion industry, such as technical drawings and range plans. I feel like learning these skills is going to benefit me in future units.

I finally put together my final collection. I made decisions based on people's opinions and I also tried to incorporate as many of my best samples as I could. I wanted to make use of both my print and embroidery samples so that there was a mix of texture through my collection. 

I am happy with the way my collections looks, however if I could go back and change one thing it would be to be less safe with my designs. As this is the first fashion unit I have done I was focused on the new processes we had to do. In the future, I would like to me more experimental and out-going with my final collections. 

Unit X | Group Presentation

This week we have been working on the group collection for the presentation to Tom from James Long.

Although we have been going into the studio and working around each other while we talk through ideas, we have been working on our own collections, just keeping links between them. Our drawing styles really vary so we worked together to create 12 final garments that incorporate everyone's designs.

We all sat and decided on what outfits we were going to create before drawing them out. This really helped us to not throw garments together for the sake of it, and we thought a lot about placement, colour and texture. Elle and I drew the garment shapes, then each of us filled in the area which was taken from our designs. This worked really well for us as our drawing styles came together successfully without the job being left to one person. I am proud of our final line up and I think we worked really well as a team.

Unit X | Starting to Design

This week we started to take our ideas and turn them into actual designs. Me and Pipp are used to just sampling fabrics and materials, so this is another step further for us. I have previously experimented with placing prints onto very plain and basic garments however I haven't yet designed my own in such detail.

I really enjoyed designing different outfits. I started by drawing templates in order to put in different prints in different places and experiment with placement and tones. During our tutorial with Louise, she told us about range plans and showed us Prada 14 as an example. The collection followed a certain set of trends or elements and injected them into various different garments. For example, they repeatedly used large faces on their designs, imitations of bra shapes on the chest and sports trims. 

I tried to keep this in mind when creating my own designs. I wanted to keep our concept of martial arts in mind at the same time, so I decided to repeat these elements; cross over v-neck, cinching at the waist, culottes, various fabrics wrapped around the body and sheer fabrics. I chose each of these based on martial arts uniforms such as karate jackets and kickboxing shorts.