A Creative September
The last two weeks of September for me have been full of creative experiences and adventures in London; meeting lots of designers and gaining many more contacts in TENT and catching up with people I have met before from university, workshops and other networking events.
TENT London took place at the Old Truman Brewery, in Shoreditch, London. The most important aspect was getting a taste of what life is like exhibiting my work as a professional textile designer. I learnt that TENT London was part of the London Design Festival, normally run each year in the month of September. One thing I consider for next time is to find out more about how the designers achieved running their small businesses, exploring inspirational enterprising ideas from many designers, relevant to my conceptual brand and could carry out competitor research. I felt very happy there were textile designers who work in many companies and produce textiles for interior products to a similar style that will generally inspire my visual designs in the future. I am pleased that I attended this event again, because it gave me visual ideas on how I could present my textile designs with pride and enthusiasm. This would help me to exhibit my work and products in the future, from showing my portfolio of work and it gives me confidence to talk about my work to the viewers.
The most important aspect was looking at how design processes work to achieve indigo dye patterns in the textiles industry. I learnt that John's indigo dye practice specialises in indigo fashion and home accessories. They used artisan-made skills in their designs, which was allowing them to create hand-crafted indigo soft furnishings and fabrics. Natural cottons are used for creating traditional hand-cut decorative patterns. They coat the fabrics into soybean and lime pastes, in order to boldly create blue and white finishes. One thing I would like to see the indigo dyeing industry do is seeing more of the tactile designs, for example 3D embroidery and tufting wool and use other type of fabrics. I would like to see visual perspectives upon new innovations in the textiles industry. I am glad that I visited John in the Rouge shop, because I was so curious about how indigo dyes were created into design processes. This informs my visual research skills, embroidery and before putting in designs into Photoshop. This will help me to take risks and push further boundaries as innovative approaches. I felt very happy that I have visited this shop because I had always wanted to do more research on indigo dye processes, which was informed by John's indigo dye processing.
Then, on the last weekend of September, I went to explore the Zandra Rhodes exhibition at the Fashion and Textile Museum. It is currently taking place right now until January 2020. It was founded by Zandra Rhodes in 2003, in collaboration with a Mexican architect, Ricardo Leggoretta. I was thoroughly inspired by how her textiles practices had developed throughout her professional career, all the way from the beginning, middle and end. It was simply because of how her visual research and design processes had evolved through her drawing skills, before putting them into screen printing production. Her drawings involved experimentation with scale, colour ways, pattern and composition and using different materials. It realised her textile for fashion outputs at a higher market. I would STRONGLY recommend watching the 12 minute documentary called 'Zandra's Robes' where she talks about how she had developed her love for drawing, textiles and fashion altogether. She also talks about how she realised her own business, which is now developing into a high-end market level in the textiles industry.
Zandra Rhodes' exhibition took place at the Fashion and Textile Museum located in Bermondsey Street, London. The most relevant aspect of visiting this exhibition was observing how Rhodes had put a mixture of her floral and nature-like pattern designs onto many different fabrics, including satin silks and chiffon. I have learnt that her main body of work was inspired by her drawings which is then screen printed onto fabric lengths, before they are sewn together to create bespoke dresses/garments. A variety of metallic and bright coloured pigments on fabrics were used to compose motifs into different repeated patterns.
She did illustrate how her screen printing industry works from starting to work from a original drawing, scan the drawing onto acetate, expose onto a large screen and then print onto fabric as part of the industrial print production. I felt very excited to had learnt how she managed to do so much work in many different disciplines in a mixture of screen printing, drawing, fashion and costume, to make her brand more focused and exciting. Therefore, it makes me want to vary similar disciplines that could be used into my textile practice.
What I saw of her show was the cohesiveness on a variety of colour palettes put together, when presenting a body of work at her exhibition. This would had been beneficial in understanding what is the colour story behind the work. I understood the conceptual messages being conveyed from each theme.
I would most definitely like to pick up Rhodes’s drawing and printing skills, using my own skills learnt from my own designer experiences. This would then help me to express what I am seeing as a designer-maker in architectural patterns. Observational drawings can be taken into many forms to develop them as an ongoing analytical progress until the end of a practical process. Her hand drawing and printing techniques could be applied to my textile designs, by experimenting with a variety of formal elements; e.g. composition, patterns, colour, shape and scale.
Here is a little throwback which I am now allowed to share......I was interning for Zandra Rhodes for a day in the same week as New Designers. This is where I learnt about and experienced the screen printing industry; involving hands-on screen printing in bigger screens, printing in three different colour ways using different long length fabrics and mixing different colour pigments and binders using syringes. This demonstrated how the screen printing industry runs in Zandra Rhodes' business, taking pride in what she loves doing in her career.
TENT London took place at the Old Truman Brewery, in Shoreditch, London. The most important aspect was getting a taste of what life is like exhibiting my work as a professional textile designer. I learnt that TENT London was part of the London Design Festival, normally run each year in the month of September. One thing I consider for next time is to find out more about how the designers achieved running their small businesses, exploring inspirational enterprising ideas from many designers, relevant to my conceptual brand and could carry out competitor research. I felt very happy there were textile designers who work in many companies and produce textiles for interior products to a similar style that will generally inspire my visual designs in the future. I am pleased that I attended this event again, because it gave me visual ideas on how I could present my textile designs with pride and enthusiasm. This would help me to exhibit my work and products in the future, from showing my portfolio of work and it gives me confidence to talk about my work to the viewers.
Plymouth College of Art Stand, consisting of BA (Hons) degree courses including Illustration and Printed Textiles and Surface Pattern Design
Camille Walala
East London's Rug Floor Story
Heather Orr
Safomasi
Next day, I visited John from Indigo Blue John who also works in a furniture shop called Rouge, located in Stoke Newington, London. I remembered to see John there on a Sunday, when I was staying in London on a weekend. He told me about the history of indigo dyeing, which involved dyeing and printing in the textiles industry, contextualising in fashion and home accessories. He kindly gave me indigo samples for me to use for experimentation.
The most important aspect was looking at how design processes work to achieve indigo dye patterns in the textiles industry. I learnt that John's indigo dye practice specialises in indigo fashion and home accessories. They used artisan-made skills in their designs, which was allowing them to create hand-crafted indigo soft furnishings and fabrics. Natural cottons are used for creating traditional hand-cut decorative patterns. They coat the fabrics into soybean and lime pastes, in order to boldly create blue and white finishes. One thing I would like to see the indigo dyeing industry do is seeing more of the tactile designs, for example 3D embroidery and tufting wool and use other type of fabrics. I would like to see visual perspectives upon new innovations in the textiles industry. I am glad that I visited John in the Rouge shop, because I was so curious about how indigo dyes were created into design processes. This informs my visual research skills, embroidery and before putting in designs into Photoshop. This will help me to take risks and push further boundaries as innovative approaches. I felt very happy that I have visited this shop because I had always wanted to do more research on indigo dye processes, which was informed by John's indigo dye processing.
Scarves:
Cushions:
Fabric lengths:
Then, on the last weekend of September, I went to explore the Zandra Rhodes exhibition at the Fashion and Textile Museum. It is currently taking place right now until January 2020. It was founded by Zandra Rhodes in 2003, in collaboration with a Mexican architect, Ricardo Leggoretta. I was thoroughly inspired by how her textiles practices had developed throughout her professional career, all the way from the beginning, middle and end. It was simply because of how her visual research and design processes had evolved through her drawing skills, before putting them into screen printing production. Her drawings involved experimentation with scale, colour ways, pattern and composition and using different materials. It realised her textile for fashion outputs at a higher market. I would STRONGLY recommend watching the 12 minute documentary called 'Zandra's Robes' where she talks about how she had developed her love for drawing, textiles and fashion altogether. She also talks about how she realised her own business, which is now developing into a high-end market level in the textiles industry.
Zandra Rhodes' exhibition took place at the Fashion and Textile Museum located in Bermondsey Street, London. The most relevant aspect of visiting this exhibition was observing how Rhodes had put a mixture of her floral and nature-like pattern designs onto many different fabrics, including satin silks and chiffon. I have learnt that her main body of work was inspired by her drawings which is then screen printed onto fabric lengths, before they are sewn together to create bespoke dresses/garments. A variety of metallic and bright coloured pigments on fabrics were used to compose motifs into different repeated patterns.
Large-scaled repeat wall hangings:
Dresses:
She did illustrate how her screen printing industry works from starting to work from a original drawing, scan the drawing onto acetate, expose onto a large screen and then print onto fabric as part of the industrial print production. I felt very excited to had learnt how she managed to do so much work in many different disciplines in a mixture of screen printing, drawing, fashion and costume, to make her brand more focused and exciting. Therefore, it makes me want to vary similar disciplines that could be used into my textile practice.
Original design idea:
Put your design onto acetate:
Large-scaled designs exposed onto screens:
Screen printing onto fabric:
What I saw of her show was the cohesiveness on a variety of colour palettes put together, when presenting a body of work at her exhibition. This would had been beneficial in understanding what is the colour story behind the work. I understood the conceptual messages being conveyed from each theme.
I would most definitely like to pick up Rhodes’s drawing and printing skills, using my own skills learnt from my own designer experiences. This would then help me to express what I am seeing as a designer-maker in architectural patterns. Observational drawings can be taken into many forms to develop them as an ongoing analytical progress until the end of a practical process. Her hand drawing and printing techniques could be applied to my textile designs, by experimenting with a variety of formal elements; e.g. composition, patterns, colour, shape and scale.
Here is a little throwback which I am now allowed to share......I was interning for Zandra Rhodes for a day in the same week as New Designers. This is where I learnt about and experienced the screen printing industry; involving hands-on screen printing in bigger screens, printing in three different colour ways using different long length fabrics and mixing different colour pigments and binders using syringes. This demonstrated how the screen printing industry runs in Zandra Rhodes' business, taking pride in what she loves doing in her career.
Screen printing production:
Here are the photos of each fabric I screen printed and now made into bespoke dresses, which is called the Jubilee collection for Spring Summer 20 season. I am very excited to see that it is now available at Liberty London, in store from Winter 2019/2020. The Jubilee collection consists of jewel flowers and jubilee circles, which celebrates Zandra's 50 years. I am just so happy, proud and grateful that I got the opportunity to see the fabrics I printed being seen at Liberty London both in-store and online and on Zandra Rhodes’ website.
Jewel Flower Dress:
Spring Summer 20: The Jubilee Collection
I had so many people saying to me that Zandra Rhodes is amazing place to do a screen printing internship; involving lots of printing onto different fabrics, mixing pigments and playing with metallic and bright colours in Zandra's work. I am so glad and grateful that my degree course had offered that opportunity for an interview to do this internship. I had to show off my best experimental printing samples in a five minute interview. Then, the next piece of good news was being informed that I was selected to do an Zandra Rhodes internship for the day.
My advice to you all wanting to visit exhibitions/trade shows where ever in the world you go, is making sure that you make the most of viewing the work on display. I would strongly recommend taking lots of photographs, asking lots of questions and explore further art and design disciplines than textiles. This will inspire and encourage you to make your work innovative, different and outstanding in your practices. Finally, PLEASE PLEASE give and dedicate yourself time to explore the context behind the work, so you can get the conceptual understanding of their practice.
Love Farrah x
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