STYLING/PROMOTION/TREND REPORT

During week six, we learnt about styling and promotion. This included many things such as trend report, styling and we ended up creating concepts through images and trends based around our own identity. I thoroughly enjoyed this week surprisingly, as I always considered myself to be more of a designer than a stylist but the whole process of this week came very naturally to me. The idea of coming up with different outfits, organising and setting up my own photo shoot seemed quite daunting at the start but everything fell into place easily.

On the Monday, we had to bring in polaroid's that represented us so we could get a feel of what we were about in small snapshots. Mine were quite silly and playful, with the use of props consisting of hats, big fur coat and my hair I was able to convey different expressions. Not only did we have these as a starting point, we also had to do a style-a-thon. In the style-a-thon, we had to bring in many items of clothing, props and accessories to style a member of our group in 10mins coming up with a different look. with the help of raiding my mum's wardrobe, I managed to find a bunch of old coats and jackets that were fun to layer and play around with. I also used a pair of vintage dungarees and sunglasses.

The next day was trend reporting from which we researched current trends from the high street, high end and small boutiques. Using the trends we found we made a trend board that presented all of the trends and had notes on why they were significantly popular and relevant to todays target market. We then had to present it to the rest of the group and that was followed up with questions and discussion of our opinions on the trends themselves.

 

 

 

The final project for this week was to do our own photo shoot or film, styled and set up by us. The final outcome was going to represent us and before  the shoot started, we had to put together mood boards that gave us inspiration for the styling, casting, hair/makeup, location, props etc. Once the mood boards gave an overall sense of what the shoot would consist of and how it would look, it was time to get it started. At first I wanted to use two models to convey the fact I am a Gemini, using two people would have shown the two different personalities but in the end I only used one. In the end I guess it worked out for the better as it showed one person and two looks and didn't over complicate. My theme for the photo shoot was grunge (which happened to be one of the words on my identity mind map) but to contrast and show another side of my personality, I created a more sophisticated, mature, tailored look. The location was an abandoned area in Brick Lane near Allen gardens as I loved the rustic, rural look against the colourful graffiti surrounding (again in reference to contrast and being a Gemini). For the casting, ideally I would've used a female but I decided to think outside of the box, similar to a Joe Mckenna spread in which he used the opposite sex to represent his style. So I used a male to be different and in a way that decision does contribute to my personal way of thinking. To represent each personality, I had two looks: a grunge look using plaid shirts, ripped jeans, black boots, t-shirts and a big sheepskin coat giving off a laid-back, relaxed effect and had typical elements of grunge to it. For the second look, a simple tailored suit with a bow tie around the arm to portray myself as an individual and different.

ACCESSORIES

Week five was accessories week. This consisted of taking an object special to us or with a relevance to our identity and developing it to create a design worthy of becoming an accessory, whether it be shoes, bags, jewellery or something out of the ordinary.

I chose to use a piece of volcanic rock from Barbados as my special object. The main reasons for using this was the fact that I am partly from the island, the volcanic rock also brought back memories from past visits with my family and had a sense of nostalgia and also the unusual shape and glittering surface was very unique and beautiful to look at. The idea of turning this piece of rock into an accessory threw me but after photocopying it, making repeats of it, making the copies negative and moving the shape around, I finally came to a shape I was satisfied with. With my final shape, I enlarged and minimised it to create different patterns to see what it would look like as various types of accessories.

In the end we had to work on a mannequin to see how it could be shaped and made into an actual accessory and once we were settled with it we could make the end result. Opting for a sculptural back piece of jewellery, I used metal wire to construct a linked chain. Overall accessories week, had to be the most difficult and challenging for me, as I never had a large interest in it but I learnt a lot and hope to take it further to benefit upcoming projects.

 

KNIT

Week four began a very different journey and quite an exciting one at that. The experience of using actual knitting machines, compared to the usual two needles and ball of yarn was a big shock. However it opened my eyes to the more exciting side to knitting and the knitwear side to the fashion industry. As an activist, the fast-paced aspect of knitting and learning techniques appealed to me a lot and allowed me to get very hands-on.

During the first day, we had learnt a number of techniques from the basic casting-on to honeycombing, ladders, drop stitch and 3D effects of pyramids and bubbles. Not only was it fun to learn something new and out of my comfort zone, it also got me thinking about how these techniques and effects are used in everyday knitwear. Suddenly I found myself studying peoples everyday knitted garments and figuring out what technique had been used to give the effect. Within the next few days, the techniques became more complex, although it was more rewarding to have created something that is used quite frequently in knitwear.

By the end of the week I had learnt a number of techniques and even created some of my own by improvising and changing patterns around. My favourite outcome would have to be the fringing as is turned out very well first time and gave a lovely finish.



Hem

Cable

Waffle

Stripes

Honeycomb

Orange peel

Fringing