its a scary world out there

some days i wish i could be a kid again and sit infront of the tv and be completely oblivious of the future, starting to wonder whether or not to take a placement year in between 2nd and third year has been a hot topic in my flat and its got me thinking and id rather not have to think already, life seems to be forward planned so much i feel like i dont have anytime to myself to do what i want to do or be with who i want to be with, but i live so far away from some people i dont even know how permanent a part of their life i am.

dress up!

 In our first term at Coventry University one of the projects was to take pattern cutting lessons and learn how to adapt a basic dress block. By that I mean take the basic dress shape and decide upon the length of your dress, whether it would have long sleeves or short sleeves and what shape it would have. In our pattern cutting lessons we also went into detail on darts and different panels you can create by cutting into these but or the purpose of the dresses we made we only had to adapt our dresses to the specifications I firstly mentioned. In initial sewing machine classes we made a half toile, which basically means a practise piece to learn the seams and how to sew in interfacing etc so that any problems you do encounter you'll be able to resolve them for when you begin your final dress. I think this is a really good idea and is standard practise for most dressmakers as although we were only making these dresses out of calico and for all intents and purposes toiles ive made before have been out of calico, the cost ratio of mistakes when doing a final garment in for example silk isnt an issue for this particular dress but if i had been making it out of material that cost hundreds of pounds doing it in a same weight fabric that costs a pittance compared to the final one would of been cost effective. It also means that for example if your making something out of a material like jersey you would have to toile in jersey as such a stretchy fabric isnt to a block standard size and in calico would be different measurements.
When it came to making our final dresses we first had to cut out our pattern pieces on calico, the material which was being supplied by the university which was really good as by this point in the term (and like always with me) I was fast running out of money ! We worked in pairs and I worked with steph lying all pattern pieces as close together to save fabric and ensure they all fitted on, we also had to make sure they ran straight of grain, so that that the fabric would hang right whilst on the body. For example the underneath panels of the collar had to sit at a 45 degree angle to provide more stretch to them, which is why its important to label all of this information on your pattern pieces to avoid mistakes and confusion when it comes to this stage.
Once we had cut all our pieces out (and this was such a long process) we then had classes every week where we worked through different stages of the dress with the plan being that on the week we had to hand them in everyone would be finished. Ofcourse this didnt go to plan and we all fell behind, stumbling over certain seams/zips/facing/overlocking and there not being enough machines and so on the last week it was a mad dash to finish on time and neatly press our garments and hand in ! We also had jeans to do that week (blog post to follow) and a head and hat to hand in so our hand in for first term were pretty manic! Also second and third years also needed the teachers help and the sewing machines at the same time as our group did so using the facilities in that week i really wouldnt ever recommend it was crazy !! I was quite pleased with how my dress turned out, I think if i had planned my time alot more efficiently and really pushed myself in the first couple of weeks to stay on track in all the lessons and perhaps refer back to my half toile alot more than I wouldnt of fallen behind as much and then the standard of quality of the garment handed in at the end would of been much higher! Im proud that i completed it and learn't how to make a dress, but i feel if i was to try and make the exact dress again i wouldnt be able to as in the last few weeks of teaching it got a bit too crazy and everything was rushed being told at you (which is completely understandable!) which is another reason why i wish i had stayed more up to date so i could of properly absorbed the information! But for a first attempt its not too bad !!! After all this year is a learning curve!!

Skulls Skulls Skulls

A quick picture of another drawing i did where i incorporated two different skulls to create a more interesting pattern. Here i drew a simple shape of a elephant skull in black ink pen keeping the lines clean and simple and then into this i drew lots of leopard skulls, inking out the teeth, eye sockets and noses which i thought looked really exciting, the limited colour palette of black and white we are using for this project looks really good with  the skulls especially with this idea of blacking out all the solid shapes of eyes and noses and teeth and gives this idea of you being watched. I like the idea of experimenting with reversing this effect creating a positive and negative effect for both and seeing how these would look alongside each other as part of a print. I also need to start looking at different sizes of these prints and also looking at particular sections and using them separately or as part of this print. I have already starting scanning this images and reducing the size of them, which is what ive been working with to create the silhouettes of the dresses for the tiger/vertebrae dress ideas, but in class tomorrow i think im going to reduce this further and also start picking apart the prints and looking at placements across the body.

'I had a pocket full of dreams But I gave them all to you''

These are my initial drawings based on the skull of a tiger and a fish vertebrae that I drew using ink to block out the eye of the tiger to create a interesting haunting dimension to this piece and add more depth, i also liked the idea of beginning to intertwine the skeletons of different creatures to create more interesting patterns. Here i have just looked at taking the shapes and moulding it to the body to see about large placements of prints on the body and also the different silhouettes created by the bones for the body. I dont think any of these are exceptional but I think its a good idea to use 'croquis' and come up with as many design ideas as possible and play around with positioning of prints and patterns on the human body. (sorry the quality of the photos is so bad, my camera isnt working at the moment so im relying on my trusty phone..) I also just had a look at my previous entry on dior couture dresses and have been looking at new collections gracing LFW catwalks currently and I need to spend alot more time creating a much more interesting silhouette and then looking at incorporating the print into this, I struggle alot with garment silhouettes as I am much more interested in print and patterns so I really need to push myself at looking at other designers and starting to become more focused on creating exciting shapes for the body as well as the print.

Dior Couture Fall 2006

Ive been starting to look at the silhouettes and shapes of garments for my 'skull project' as eventually our patterns will be made on fabric and this will be made into a garment, I decided to look at previous Dior couture collections and found this one amazing the shapes, pattern placements and different layering techniques and gatherings. Galliano is a genius and looking through old collections including 'Les incroyables' 1984, his graduate collection I felt sad that he is no longer allowed to show off his undoubted amazing creavitity...

Live Fast, Die Old

On Friday I had machine inductions, including using the laser cutter, sonic welders, spot machines and tape dispensers ! All of the technology actually amazed me, I knew Coventry had all of these available on the course as thats what really stood out to me when applying, but i was so excited to finally be able to use them! Its all part of our project where im creating a pattern based on skulls, but ofcourse we can choose what we like to use and also use them throughout the rest of the time at university.

First of all I had a lesson on the laser cutting machine, we were shown the computer programmes for making simple shapes as this is what we were doing in the class, making a 'button' to test out and experiment to see what we could produce. We were also told that creating patterns in illustrator we would then be able to put them into this programme, im quite excited by this as there was lots of examples of complex and intricate patterns in the laser cutting room and im hoping for this project we will be able to really push ourselves and maybe begin to experiment on illustrator to produce a high quality pattern for our garments ! For the class however we were just doing the simple task as mentioned previously of producing an individual personalised button, a quick and simple task just to get used to the software and machine, in our class there was about 11 of us and we all went through the laborious stage of trying to figure out one by one how to make a button that didnt look completely awful.. there were many different ways you could play around with shapes, such as creating indentions to create indepth patterns and also cutting out multiple shapes within your shape and adding text onto it. I decided to create quite a simple button circular in shape with stars cut out round the edge and smaller stars in the middle as the button holes, also with concentric circles indented into the button throughout, I wasnt too hopeful for the outcome as it sounded pretty much as bad as it looked on the computer screen in front of me when i'd finished. Some people did really fancy attempts such as frogs and love hearts whilst others did humorous buttons like 'my name is..', however once we had all drawn out buttons on the screen, our teacher sized them down and put them in the correct format to be cut out and we chose our colour plastic.. Red! We then turned the laser cutter on and waited for the end result ! I was amazed when they came out they looked so clean cut and precise, although mine looked fussy and overwhelming in pattern on the screen when it came out of the machine it was so interesting to look at, everyone seemed equally as happy as me at the outcome and it really excited me for the prospects of this project !! I love having machine inductions because it gives you a chance to see how everything works and get a chance to do something basic and play around rather than say having an idea of your final design to cut out before youve even had a chance to see how/what the machines can do! Also Scarlett (our lecturer) said that many universitys dont allow students to laser cut themselves so im so glad we can, although her stories of fires did scare me a little.. im happy I get to be in control of the process from start to finish. By that i mean i get to look at skulls, sketch skulls, develop patterns from these sketches and then produce these patterns and then make a garment from these patterns ! I love the whole process !