Evaluation of Unit X.

At the beginning of the unit, we formed larger groups to learn how to identify forthcoming trends. During this initial period, talks from Trend Boutique's Sally Denton, presentations from university staff Alex and Laura and our own research helped us to become hyper-aware of the world around us, identifying key issues that could affect design in the future.

Exploring social, economic and political factors showed us that it is important to look at other issues, giving a project more body and meaning and ensuring that you are resolving a larger problem through design. However, developing this understanding was difficult, it was like training your mind to think in a completely different way.

Our presentation looked at several issues, however when the groups were condensed down, me and Beth felt that the most important and interesting issue that we wanted to explore was the shift of people shoppping online as opposed to in store. We decided that higher-end designers might want to combat this and reverse the effect that technology appears to be having on the store.

We thought that it would be both interesting and challenging and it has proven to be both. Initially, the mock-ups below were a way of visualising our concept. The idea of developing fabrics that could not be photographed became a key idea that our entire trend revolved around.

After establishing the ideas that we wanted to explore further, it was important to us that we kept our selected audience in mind. We both wanted to aim for a high-end client. I felt like this audience could be reached through presentation: Using presentation that is considered, high quality and a finish that reflects this (eg size and format of the book).

Beginning to transform our ideas from an abstract concept to a tangible, visual reality was extremely difficult. We developed many, many ideas to try and personify our concept but it became quite frustrating having nothing but words and we needed to try and shift into visual territory.
We began to explore the concept of over-packaging products, concealing them in an attractive but temporary covering. Other designers already used this method (see Zara, left)to build a sense of anticipation to pull away the layers to reveal the product inside.

Our ideas had to be visually collated and then arranged beautifully and developed into a trend book. This was a particularly daunting prospect, considering we were yet to produce any visual work of our own.

 

 

Myself and Beth decided to take the concept of over packaging to an extreme and developed a series of photographs to visually represent our ideas. The box series of photographs appeared to work beautifully, presenting a selection of materials including frosted plastics against a stark white background, creating a sleek and clean aesthetic.

Working in a pair seems to work really well for both me and Beth. We feed from each other's ideas, encourage one and other when we seem to hit a wall. Also, we share an eye for presentation and attention to detail. This ensured that we could both present ideas and imagery creatively and beautifully and keeping to a style that we both enjoy working in.

Our partnership helped to create lots of interesting ideas that grew and evolved into a range of visuals, representing ideas such as overpackaging, encasing (in ice) and changing state, meaning that something could never be captured in its true form.

 

Both of us also found the importance of planning and arranging our images paramount, in order to present them well enough to speak for themselves. Organisation ensured that we knew exactly how we wanted to lay our images out.

Varying our layout and using some photographs as whole page spreads will hopefully look visually exciting and will help to showcase some of the best images. I'm still very intrigued as to what the book will look like as a finished product as Reprographics (where the book is being produced) are apparently leaving producing our book to the very last minute.

 Progressing through the book has been particularly difficult. Due to time limits, we had to produce a large amount of pages for our book in a week, with only our own judgement to go by. However, this was one of the benefits of having a partner to work with. It meant that we could alter and change any aspects we were unsure of and pull each other back from insanity when we found the work tough.

I feel like the finished layout of the book appeals to our intended, high end designer clientele and this can be seen in the ways in which we have chosed to package our book.
We have decided that we would like to continue our concept through our presentation of our book. We have created several boxes that fit inside one and other (in a similar way to our photographs), exploring our over-packaged and encased concept further.

Overall, I feel that I have worked really well as a team with Beth. We have created and developed a large body of work with finesse in quite a short amount of time. We have powered through obstacles such as time limitations to allow for printing and production, juggled a live brief alongside the main body of our work and have managed to excecute both well.