Evaluation of Locating

I have found this unit quite challenging in a number of ways. I found the time frames of the live brief were quite tight and the turn around from beginning to end was at a much quicker pace than what I am used to working at. This has however, taught me to work to a high standard at a high rate and I feel that this is good preparation for the future.

Working to a live brief for knitwear label, Leutton Postle, was also a challenge. As a brand, they work using bright colours, contrasting texture and in a very expressive way. This is very different to the way that I usually work and this immediately put me outside of my comfort zone. With a different way of working and a very small amount of time to create my samples, I felt as though I was floundering a little.

When it came to the crit, I felt even more disheartened. The criticism that I did receive did not seem to be constructive and there were no comments on how the samples could be improved. This made it difficult to extract some things that I felt personally went well and worked to carry through to my personal project.

I decided eventually that I liked the blend of textures and unusual combinations of fabrics and yarns and that this was something that could be refined and developed for the upcoming personal project.

By this point, time again appeared to be working against me and I felt rushed and began panicking. I did eventually begin work on my personal project, focussing on bones as a starting point. Visiting the musuem for research was an interesting experience and I did learn that trips like those must be booked in advance, organisation is vital.

 I feel that my photographs from this part of the project are a particularly strong aspect of my work. I think capturing the detail was important and they have filtered through into the sampling process. Developing these photographs further, I also found the microscope images to be really strong too.

The photographs allowed me to venture into the hidden aesthetic of bones. It allowed me to see the irregular surface and edges of the bones, as well as extract marks and colours that I felt were the most beautiful from the photographs and that I would like to work with and develop them into knitting samples.

 

The short amount of time that was left for sampling has taught me that I can produce a large volume of work in a short amount of time. I have struggled at times, however I have still made time to experiment and try new things.

 

If I was to do this unit again, I would most definitely try and develop my samples as garment shapes, in order to see how they would look if they were used for their intended purpose. I also want to work on my garment construction skills as this is something that I find interesting.

 





Overall, my samples have turned out quite well. There was an element of designing on the spot involved. This was due to a small amount of time given for sampling, however this has surprisingly produced some lovely things. I have experimented with technique, blending yarn and colour and I think that they work well. I am more pleased with my efforts and keeping my head above water, even when I felt like I was struggling with time management.

 

 

Visualisations of context

 I decided that the best way to attempt showing my samples in their intended context would be to photograph the samples pinned to a mannequin.

I was slightly apprehensive about trying to manipulate my samples into shapes that represented my samples in the way that I wanted them to look. I tried out several combinations with each of the samples but only decided that a small number of these worked.

I am pleased with the samples themselves, however I feel that these visualisations may work better if the samples were created more with the body in mind and were created in the shapes of blocks so that the intended use of the sample could be visually realised.



I spoke to Sue after taking the photographs and discussing the difficulties of pinning them to a mannequin in a shape that is not appropriate. She understood the difficulties that I had and suggested that in the future it may be better to work using the blocks to shape the samples. She informed me that she worked to an 8th scale (creating samples to the 8th of the intended size) as she did when she was a freelance knitwear designer. It all makes perfect sense now and I feel that the next unit will be a good oppertunity to explore silhouette further and to also brush up on my shaping skills to create sleeves, front panels etc.

 Although I do not feel that these photographs work as well as they could, I feel that the samples would work well in a fashion context, if they were given the shapes that they needed in order to hang beautifully on the body.

Final samples

Due to time constraints, I only had time to knit with the intent of using them as final samples. I decided to really pay attention to detail and experimentation throughout and felt that this should be a consistent feature throughout the collection of samples.

The image (left) shows a sample that I created by using the pockets technique on the dubied. Rather than knitting the entire sample with pockets, I decided to experiment and transferred some sections to the back bed, knitted the whole sample as double bed, therefore creating some areas with pockets (which I stuffed with mohair) and some areas knitted with floats instead of pockets. I was so pleased that the sample worked as it was a stab in the dark and an experiment. I think the overall look of this particular sample is one of the strongest that I produced.

I also created a sample that involved transferring stitches to the back bed and pushing the needles out of action, creating areas of large ladders/floats. This was a particularly time consuming and tedious sample to complete as you had to knit each row very slowly and cautiously to ensure that the feeder was introducing the yarn to the needles where it should be. That being said, I am really pleased with the outcome. The shimmery black yarn contrasts well with the cream/pink main yarn.

 The structural yet free moving nature of the technique creates a soft/strong looking fabric.

I have also featured closer photographs of samples that I also felt worked the best. I had used techniques such as dropstitch to create an irregular shape to some of my samples. I also feel that the reversible circles technique (used on both above images) creates an interesting surface, representing the texture of the bones photographs well.

Identifying colour and mood

 

I took this part of the project to identify the colour palette of my collection. I had extracted this from my photographs and practical work and decided to work with cream tones, khaki, deep rich browns and blacks. I felt that this would work well, particularly if I chose yarns that were a spectrum of textures that could intereact with one and other.

I also put together a mood/story board that indicates my main images of inspiration. I think that the clean and minimalistic format of the boards works and looks professional. They are clear, consise and yet I feel they say what they need to say about my project.

Fernan Federici

Federici is first and foremost a scientist and leader in his field. I, however was more interested in his beautiful photographs that have been taken down a microscope.

In a very similar way to my own photographs, he has revealed a realm of hidden beauty by zooming in close to things such as bacteria.

The beautiful photographs reveal an apparent drawn element to bacterial matter and plant roots. The hidden colours are also something to be noted. The image above reveals an entire spectrum from rusty orange to icy blues.

Microscope photography.

I decided that I wanted to look more closely at bones under a microscope, to pick up on hidden detail that could be identified and applied to my samples.

I saved some bones from a chicken carcass and inspected them under the microscope and photographed down the lens of the device.

I love these images and think that they reveal a different and unexpected aesthetic to what you would usually assume of bones. I love the ridges and textural surface that cannot be seen by the naked eye. I'm not as keen on the colours however and I feel that I might be more inclined to use the lighter tones that can be found in the photographs. See sketchbook for more images.

Museum photographs

Waiting for my appointment time to photograph the human remains collection at the musuem was a little frustrating and at times I felt that the research aspect of my project were really suffering. I'll know in the future that I need to pre-organise my visit well in advance, in order to get my research sooner.

Sally, who organised my appointment also informed me that they have a wide collection of other objects of interest, such as crystals, taxidermy, fossils. This could be useful for future projects, so it was a good connection to have made.

I was left with a collection of human bones by the museum curator. I basically had free reign with the bones and was even allowed to handle them. I did (at times) feel some pangs of uneasiness when I considered that I'm actually holding human bones, however I needed to just take the photographs. The image, above, is of detail found on several areas of most of the bones that I was presented with. I love the spongy, irregular texture, something not typically associated with bones. I also think the placement of the texture is really interesting and something that could be considered when sampling.

 

 

This second image also shows some details that I found interesting. The irregular, wavy lines that appear to be cracks are in fact the bones that are separated at birth and fuse together as you progress through to adulthood. I found the marks organic and beautiful. The rest of the images can be found in my sketchbook.

 

 



Calvin Klein Collection S/S 14

 Another collection that encapsulates the mood of the samples I want to create, is Calvin Klein Collection S/S 14.

The garments I have featured display excellent attention to detail, work with texture and opposing weights of fabric and tone on tone, which is something that I may explore as part of my project.

I also love the soft movement that the tassel detail lends to the garment and the exploration of tassels and trims from my Leutton Postle work could be something that could be carried further and could filter down into my personal project samples.



I also love the raw hemlines that are a consistent feature throughout the collection. I need to bare in mind features that tie a collection together and I feel that looking at pre-existing collections is helping me to take note of small features that help to marry the individual pieces together.

I think that yarn choices and technique will help to unite my samples and it is definitely something that I need to develop and work on during this part of the unit as I feel that the definition of my collection as a whole for Leutton Postle may have let my work down slightly.

Missoni S/S 14

 

After deciding to look at bones as a starting point to the personal part of my project, I wanted to look at some designers and their collections to help build an aesthetic and vibe to work towards.

 

I adore the laddered detail and movement of these pieces by Missoni, S/S 14. I think the devil is in the detail and these pieces look considered but at the same time the free movement of the ladders is beautiful.

 

I also think that the colour palette of off whites with the dark slate grey is complimentary towards the great craftsmanship and use of technique on the garments, showcasing placement and construction.

 

I like the idea of also using off-whites and it links well with the idea of using bones as a starting point for my project.

 

I do, however wish to use other colours to accent the creams that I intend to use, in similar way to Missoni. Using foils (as in my Leutton Postle work) may also help to lift the appearance of my work. Unlike my samples for Leutton Postle work, I will want to use foil that is quite similar to the yarns used, providing an accent and an extra texture.

 

Bones

After struggling to think of a new theme to develop my work from, I decided to have a conversation with my tutor, Laura, to see which aspects of my work for Leutton Postle were strong and should be carried through.

We both agreed that working with texture and blending unusual yarns with plastics and leathers was something that really worked and could be developed. I decided to run with this idea but still needed a theme to underpin the entire collection.

As I wanted to also consider the shape of my samples, I thought that the irregularity of bones could be a really interesting starting point.

I decided to gather research via medical journals from the library but wanted to also source my own images. I organised an appointment at The Manchester Museum to photograph human remains from their collection.

Fresh start

After such an intensive few weeks of working on my Leutton Postle live brief, I really wanted to move on with my personal project, leaving most of the work from the live brief behind. As I was working so far out of my comfort zone, I felt that it was importnat to return to me. I wanted to revert back to the way that I like to work and communicate my own vision again.

I did, however feel that it might be a shape to completely abandon all aspects of the work I have done for Leutton Postle and decided to extract small details to carry through to my personal project. I really loved combining unusual yarn qualities to create an interesting surface. My previous posts show the blending of mohair, lurex, plastic monofilaments and leather. I thought this playful combination of materials was really interesting and with some refinement, this way of working could be transferred to my personal project.

I also really liked the idea of working back on top of the samples after they had been knitted. Techniques such as foiling and embellishment may come into play, as well as joining additional fabrics (perhaps leather as before).

Crit with Sam Leutton

My first experience of a crit was with Sam Leutton of Leutton Postle. I was nervous but at the same time quite excited to present my ideas and the samples that I had worked really hard on over the fortnight of sampling time that was allotted.

I knew that the crit would be a chance to explain my choices of yarn, stitch quality and colour palette. However, when I came to do so, I felt like the positive aspects of the samples were overlooked. I am completely aware that crits are meant to deliver critique but I feel that the critique should be constructive and that positive points should also be touched upon. I felt that Sam seemed slightly aloof and uninterested throughout the whole of my presentation and the feedback I did receive was very much the same.

I left the crit feeling as though I had not really gained anything from the experience and felt pretty deflated and was left doubting my abilities. I knew that my speed at developing samples had improved and I know that there were aspects of the samples that did work well but I felt like all the effort that was put into them was not really noticed.

I have enjoyed working to a client specific brief and pushing myself out of my comfort zone by using varied bright colours and unusual textures and this may encourage me to be brave when choosing colours in the future.

I want to take these positives away from the experience as a whole and try and move on from the crit as I didn't find it useful or encouraging.

Bondable Film

As blending unusual materials was a recurring theme throughout the sampling process, I wanted to constantly test myself and push this as far as possible. I discovered bondable film, which is basically angelina fibres that have been processed into a flat sheet that bonds to itself when treated with heat.

I loved the bright, iridescent nature of the film. The transparency was also something that I found interesting and I tried using the film to finish an edge to act as a trim and to trap other materials in between such as the leather tassles (see images).

The bondable film was quite difficult to control successfully. It was also quite annoying that the film would only bond to itself and not other fibres or yarns from the sections of knitting. I do, however think that the colour and texture works beautifully with the leather and could be experimented with further.

More trims and details

 

I began to use some of my other yarns to create detailed trims. The fringing above was created by e-wrapping individually cut lengths of a royal blue acetate floss yarn. I liked the free movement of the yarn fringing and felt that it was a way of tying the samples together, even if the detail is in a different yarn.

 

 Brushing the mohair with a darker, shimmering yarn also helped to create a juxtaposition of texture- key to the entire collection of samples so far. It has been a struggle to find a use for the mohair so far. I have tried knitting it in on the machine and it kept getting caught and the same happened on the chunky gauge domestic machine also. I have found the only way to successfully use the yarn is to e-wrap or long e-wrap it in manually. It is a little disappointing and I do feel that the yarn has limited uses now but I still love the colour and hairy quality that it provides.

Tassles and Trims

I began to see a pattern in the development of my samples. I was using a lot of detailed edging techniques and fringing/ tassles. I decided to introduce leather as yet another texture, mainly due to the different quality found on the surface and on the suede. I think this will help to introduce a darker element to the samples and the movement of the tassling will serve well as detailing, making for a potentially exciting fashion fabric.

I think that the leather being used as an edge detail will also help to lift the aesthetic of the collection, hopefully reflecting the high end context that they are going to used for. The interaction with other colours and textures of yarns such as the mohair and bright oranges will be visually really interesting too.

Picot Edge with leather tassle detail.

Blending textures

I began sampling immediately after the Christmas holidays, constantly reminding myself to combine unusual textures through my choices of yarns, embellishment and any other techniques that I might use to manipulate the appearance of the sample after they had been knitted.

I began by blending materials such as lametta and monofilament with much softer and hairier yarns such as mohair (see left). Using contrasting and unusual yarns was a way of communicating the care free attitude Sophie had towards her drawings, using a strange combination of colours and media to create her marks. I felt like this was something that was working well and that should be a constant feature throughout the sampling process. The sample in the photograph also featured technical aspects, such as the Picot Edge, which the lametta was made to appear from. I think blending free use of colour and texture, combined with using refined techniques and attention to detail is what will allow the samples to work as a whole.

I particularly liked the way that the hairy quality of the fluro mohair was contrasted against the plasticity of the monofilmanet and how the stitches in monofilament seemed to contain the hair and only allowed it to come through at certain intervals.

 

 

I'm slightly concerned that the monofilament will be quite itchy to the touch and this may mean that it isn't appropriate for a fashion fabric, howvever as part of an edge or a trim, it may work well.

 

Time

I think it has become a bit of a struggle to keep up to the time constraints that the live brief has provided me with. We only had the Christmas holidays to put together a body of work to show Sam Leutton on the day we arrived back at University. From this point we only then had a further two weeks to produce and finish 6 large samples.

 I am aware that this is what the industry would be like but it has been a shock to the system. In some ways, this is positive as it is showing me how quickly I can work and I am still maintaining a level of quality that can sometimes be lost when working within small time frames.

I am however finding it quite tough and find myself coming into University early and leaving late. But at the same time, I feel that my skills on the domestic machine are improving greatly because of it and that it has almost acted like an intensive training session.

Laser Cut Kisses

I decided to push the idea of using the kisses within my body of work further. I wanted to get them produced into a tangible object that could be then used as something that could be embellished on to my samples.

 

Considering I had never laser cut before, they turned out really well. It's quite odd seeing something that started out as a flat mark on a greetings card being transformed into something you can touch and feel.

Sophie's writing

As I found the text from birthday card from Sophie really lovely, I decided to gather any other text that she had written to other family members from christmas cards and the drawings that she had drawn for me.

For me, it was not only the text that was interesting, but the "kisses" that were left at the end of her message in the card. I thought they were so interesting because of their irregularity. None of them were the same size or shape or orientation and I think this makes them even more charming, they're completely unique.

I decided to blow the kisses up. I then thought that they could be developed further, possibly into a motif or punchcard or perhaps something else to contrast against the knitting?

Care Free

The thing that I love the most about Sophie's drawings is her care free attitude towards them. She is not precious and does not seem to worry too much about choices or colours and when asked why she had chosen something, she'd often reply with "because I did want to!", said in such a way that might suggest I was being silly for asking. This was something that really interested me and I felt that it was a way that meant I could explore the mix and blending of unusual or unexpected materials together.

 I want to try and adopt Sophie's attitudes towards her drawings and break out of my quite controlled, usual way of working.


I think that the materials that you can see in the images will be quite representative of the materials that I want to use or replicate when creating my samples for Leutton Postle.

Key ideas

Interestingly, Sophie decided to draw her family (as we all have done as children). She drew her mum, dad and sister in a wide variety of materials such as sand, pencil, crayons and her favourite material, glitter.

She seemed to be drawn to it immediately. She loved the sparkle and would draw her outline in PVA glue and apply glitter, or use one of her many, many glitter glues to create marks. It was interesting to see how she dealt with a fluid material and I loved the quick nature of her drawings with the glitter.

In another piece, she started using sponges to a paint with, creating a broken, block colour mark. I thought that the edge that was created by the porous nature of the sponge was interesting. Again, speed seemed to be key here.

Childlike or drawn by a child?

The brief stated that the work should be created from a selection of reference points and I decided to focus on the "childlike" aspect. Instead of focusing on "childlike" drawings, I felt that it would be much better to look at drawings that have been done by a child. This would give the marks authenticity and would mean that the work would be organic. Trying to draw like a child and a child's drawings are actually quite different. A child draws freely, unenhibited and they are not precious. Drawing like a child can look extremely forced so it seemed like the best way to eliminate this.

I started by looking at a birthday card that I recieved from my 4 year old cousin, Sophie, who is learning to write independently and loves drawing and painting.

This also sparked an interest in looking at Sophie's writing. The placement and form of her letters was so charming and I felt like it could be a really intersting thing to look at and interpret for this brief.

I wanted to give Sophie some free reign over what she drew too, so I decided to simply provide her with paper and all of her usual materials that she already has in a box. This would help to determine both colour and texture.

Leutton Postle live brief

As part of the 'Locating' unit, it was explained that we must create work suitable for a live brief that has been provided by an external client. The brief that best suited the Knit side of textiles was provided by Leutton Postle, a luxury knitwear label.

I was both excited and nervous about starting a live brief as I had never worked specifically for a client before. I felt that I should work in the same way that I would normally, but remember that the time frame is quite small and that I need to be keeping the project constantly on the move.

I began by looking at the Leutton Postle website, to gather inspiration. I wanted to see what the label was about and get a feel for how they worked and the aesthetic of their label. The general aesthetic seemed to vary quite drastically throughout the span of their relatively short career. I assumed that this was due to the label still establishing their identity within the fashion world and felt that it could also mean that they are open to new ideas and new directions of which they may want to take their work, or at least explore.

Their current collection (S/S 14) appeared to be more sportswear-led than their past collections and I think that a sport-luxe vibe works well with the playful use of pattern and colour and could be something that I could explore further.

I also watched the fashion films created by Leutton Postle and this confirmed the playful nature of the brand and I constantly kept reminding myself that this was something that needed to remain prevalent.

See Leutton Postle's website (below).

http://leuttonpostle.com/