Evaluation - Locating Unit Project Briefs

Blog 7

Evaluation - Locating Unit Project Briefs

The journey through the Locating Unit has been challenging, working through two different briefs within the time.  The first brief I worked on was the Engineering Embroidery project.  For this I had to produce designs for the interior of a Rolls Royce, which I learnt was a very luxurious brand.   I have brought into this the embroidery skills I have learnt over the two years of university and designed the inside of the roof of the car because for me that was the most interesting place for a bespoke design.  Starting from this I have produced a range of coordinated samples.   The methods I have used for my samplings are tailor tacking, smocking and hand printing using pigment dye as well as using embellisher.   I have experimented with some other techniques but the samples I have really enjoyed working with are pigment dye and tailor tacking on top.

I chose the “The Association of Fashion and Textile Courses Award” which is part of the “Bradford Textiles Prize” for my second brief.  I chose this brief because recycling was involved.  I have gone around getting discarded materials from the fashion bins in the university as well as from charity shops.   By collecting the materials, I have constructed samples to demonstrate how we can recycle and re-use fabrics.  People throw away meters of materials sometimes in the fashion bins, which extremely useful because I feel it is better to reuse than to buy.   I have also recycled in previous units. 

I took my inspiration for this brief from the Manchester Museum because I’m really interested in the marks that showed in the fossils.  I have used pin- tucking, tailor tacking, smocking, applique, machine embroidery, trapping yarns in between sheer and solid fabrics, as well as using puff binder.   For one of the applique samples I burnt strips of synthetic organza and used French knot to attach it.   My samples are going to be adapted into fashion.   

My colour theme is very subtle with monochrome and a few other colours such as yellows, blues and browns that I took from the pictures I had taken of the fossils but, to my disappointment, my samples are mainly monochrome.  I need to look at my colour theme and samples regularly as I work, to see where I’m going and try to use the full range of colours.  In the first project I’ve brought in a lot of colour by dyeing and printing which I really enjoyed, and I should have brought some of that into the second project. 

When I look at the two sets of samples side by side, I’m much happier with the Rolls Royce project because of the colours and methods.  I need reduce the size of the samples, because some methods take a long time and by cutting down, I could concentrate on other work.  For future projects I would like to concentrate more on developing pin tucking, tailor tacking and smocking, fabric dyeing and printing.