Month: January 2020

I enjoyed this module and the challenges that came with it, adapting patterns for products particularly. I think my skills in Photoshop, digital work and pattern creation have improved a lot, although I still want to work more on this, so it becomes easier. I also think my mark making was better this term, I spent more time on it and it flowed better through my book to the patterns that eventually became digital outcomes. I was more creative this module with my research, taking every trip in Summer as potential inspiration and capturing plenty of photographs throughout, I also actively enquired to the Cardiff Museum to a contact there and was able to gain access to the Entomology Department’s archives of insects. This allowed me to get close to the insects for detailed images, something I would not have been able to do while they were alive. I think one of my biggest strengths remains using the fineliners to create the pattern that I want, I have adopted this style for years and believe I have found my handwriting style, when I transferred it to digital I was adapting to the change of a thin nib to the Apple pencil, however I found the motifs worked well. They were time consuming to complete but the perk of being digital, it could be manipulated and moved around if needed, so other options could be explored quickly, this worked for pattern and colour.

I think I could have improved on my trend research, I knew from shopping and social media that bees were trending the recent years however a search on WGSN could have been useful, as well as visiting shops and doing my own research there, however as I was unwell, I was not able to do this. I think I also could have improved my stitch work, I did some basic samples but due to timing I prioritised my digital over this, I could have really explored some interesting finishing effects to the fabric samples. Stitching could have been a nice touch over the top of the pattern on a summer dress for example, or even beading. I also would have liked the chance to do some digital stitch as I think I could make some nice repeated designs with this and tried out some interesting decorative stitches with it, I would like to properly learn how to do a good digital repeated pattern on a larger scale, I imagine it involves marking out the borders around it and a lot with measuring, the same would apply for adding stitch over digitally printed designs.

If I was to repeat this module, I would have done more research back when it was the main task that could have influenced my designs. I also would have done a wider range of motifs, some not so patterned with blocks of colour maybe, so this was an option to include more colour into the patterns sometimes.

I looked into fabric samples and what I wanted to put the patterns onto for my mini fabric collection, and I settled on young girls summer dresses. I thought the subtle patterns suited this quite well.

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There were a few unsuccessful attempts before these, where the image quality was not good so the patterns began blurry immediately. I thought these ones were quite interesting and both patterns work well on the dresses, I think the scale is also good but could be tried smaller again to see if this looks better.

I ordered samples from Fashion Formula and Contrado is find the perfect fabric for the summer dresses I planned for young girls. For the summer dress brief, I needed something quite lightweight and thin, I orginally thought of some kind of organic cotton but I actually found some of these to be quite rough or firm even when they were thin, so I knew I needed to find something softer than this for comfort purposes.

I started with fashion formula and started to sort through, thinking about my key criteria of softness, thinness and a clear image on the fabrics, as some of the thinner one became a little see-through or faded.

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These four stuck out to me for a couple of reasons, the bamboo fabric was very soft and thin but not so much that it would be see-through, I could imagine it working for the summer temperatures and being comfortable, without it being so light that it would blow in the wind too easily. I liked the quality of the cotton slub as well for the thin effect, I have worked with fabric like this before for hair accessories but I think for the dresses it may be too thin as the white was not a clear white, instead being able to see the warp and weave I think showed it was a little too thin for the purpose. The percale was interesting, it had an unusual softness to it without it being as heavy as a velvety type of material, there was also a very clear image on it as well which I think looked really nice compared to one that was more disturbed by the warp and weaves of the various other materials I was going through. The final one I found was the organic cotton interlock, I mentioned that I wanted to look for a softer organic cotton and this was a soft one, with a good level of thinness without being see-through as well. It also had a little stretch to it which I thought could be quite good for a young girls dress as it would allow for some growth in the child, it also was very colourful so shows the colours of my designs would come up much better than some other fabrics. The only thing with the Fashion Formula samples is that I noticed the details are not really included, such as a thickness of the fabric or a code or anything to identify it on the website, I originally thought it was nice that they used different patterns on them while Contrado stuck to the same pattern in each and every fabric sample, but it is only comparing the same photo on different fabrics that you can truly see the effect of it on that fabric, so I do think the Fashion Formula samples could be better if they shared the same images, at least within a category of fabrics.

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These were a few fabrics I picked out from the Contrado fabrics that I found, The pima lawn one is very thin and soft without warping too much, I do not like working with silk twill for example as it is so hard to cut a straight line in it due to the natural movement of the fabric. The janice Poplin fabric was a little thicker, but still thin enough to suit the purpose for the summer dresses, the image is very clear in terms of the pattern which I like, and does show up better than the crepe jersey one, which is a much softer fabric and at only 150gsm it is not a thick fabric either, but just by the feel and look of it I think it would feel a little hotter on the body than the other two fabrics would.

I think next it would be interesting to look into pricing for these particular fabrics that I like on the websites, maybe even looking at ordering a couple of them to show that the dresses that I am designing for could be out of a couple of fabrics, rather than just the one.

Firstly checking Contrado, I put in a size of 52 by 50 CM to have a fat quarter and be able to neaten up the edges as I want, I tried the Pima Lawn fabric first as I thought it looked interesting, the design came to 14.50 for this single piece of fabric in this size, without any discounts or anything. The Janice Poplin also came to the same price, as well as the crepe jersey.

Looking on Fashion Formula, the tools to repeat the design are a little more complex, this means that I would need to pay close attention when designing the fabric. I put in the percale fabric which came back as a fat quarter price of 12 pounds. There was another called Organic jersey interlock which was 11 pounds. The bamboo fabric was not available on the options which is disappointing, but the percale was a very nice sample one, so I may need to look at them again to make a decision.