While in London for the visit to the museums that I wanted to do, I realised how close Harrods was to where I was, so we decided to go for a walk.
Inside Harrods, London
Harrods is of course a very impressive building, such a huge environment full of different rooms and sections across many floors. The food hall was particularly interesting to look around, as my friend was looking for sweets to do for her theme this worked extremely well. We went upstairs to see the stationary and gift wrap, which I expected to be a lot larger than it was, it was around the size I could see in a normal high store store, much less of a range than in a supermarket for example. However, I did remember that Harrods offer their own gift wrapping services, which maybe a lot of people opt for, especially close to Christmas.
Harrods Giftwrap and Cards display
The sheets are immediately obvious to be of a higher quality, the foiling used is very bold and dramatic and adds a more expensive look to the sheets. The rolls of paper were not extremely expensive, at around six pounds, however that was only for around 2-3 metres, which compared to a high street store is double the price for half the paper. The cards as well are particularly sophisticated looking which I like, they are muted and decorative rather than bright and loud, I thought this was good to look at as I wanted to be able to portray a more classy look for my own card.
Overall the visit was worth it to have a look around, it was also such an iconic place that I had never been to so I am glad I got this in to the trip.
The creation of my theme moodboard was by far the most time-consuming and thoughtful, I wanted to capture my thoughts in photographs, showing the journey from thinking of a normal everyday beetle to imagining it as a cute pattern on a child’s birthday wrap.
I decided to call my collection ‘It’s a Bugs World’, as it was aimed at children and I wanted it to be a cute watercolour style that would appeal to the children as well as the parents buying it. As my research indicates, I chose ladybirds, dragonflies and jewel beetles, mostly for their colour and shapes and what I think I could do with them. I think watercolours will be something I want to look into first for a style so I included some artworks that I thought fitted the ideas in my head. I also included some photos of marshlands where it is common to find the insects that had lovely compositions and colours in them.
My colour and texture board shows the colour scheme I have chosen from several images of particularly jewel beetles and their environments around them. I chose to have quite muted colours in comparison to the bold colours also present in some of the jewel beetles as I wanted to make this collection appealing to the intended market as a difference to some of the brighter designs we often see for children. I chose some textures that I would like to experiment with in terms of creating my own bark pattern to use as a faded background for a pattern perhaps as well as the leaves and the dots which relate to the dots on a ladybird. The dragonfly wings are also very pretty and intricate and I would like to experiment with this, they remind me a lot of a leaf skeleton too which I have photographed before so this might be something to try out in the photographic darkroom for a clear spacial print of the pattern.
My occasion board represents the children’s birthday I would be aiming the patterns at, I think this could make an interesting topic for me as I have not tried out patterns for the younger generations before, tending to stick to an age range closer to my own in previous modules. While this is still something I am interested in, I would like the challenge of creating for someone else as I think it would allow me to be more free with my designs, especially when it comes to watercolour. I have enjoyed working digitally in my last unit, especially with the use of Procreate on my Ipad which has been a very useful tool, but I also want to carry on with the more traditional media I have used for most of my creative career and also welcome Procreate to try a more artistic approach, using the various watercolour brushes they have available on there.
My customer board portrays the dual-market I am currently aiming at, the young mother I picture needs to be attracted to the designs to purchase them, whether its to wrap presents for their own children or for children’s friends to go to another birthday as my target of 5-10 year olds generally do not go shopping and pick out their own wrapping paper. I also need the patterns to be attractive to a child of this age, I think avoiding the bright colours could mean that I have a unique product in the market that stands out amongst the Disney theme for example. I have not yet determined whether this collection will be aimed at mainly girls or boys, I would like to try and make it appealing to both with my varied colour board, however this may be a decision when the patterns start as I will have a better idea of what the final product will look like.
Lastly, the competitor board illustrates what I feel my collection will be competing with. I chose middle range shops as I feel the designs tend to be more cute and muted, whereas the cheaper shops tend to go quite bright and bold with their designs. My research at Harrods was interesting but I do not picture my target market shopping at such high prices for children’s wrapping paper, I would certainly be narrowing down my market if I was to choose the luxury end over this middle ground.
Paperchase is quickly becoming one of the most popular places to splash out on stationary and quirky gifts and wrapping, they also have sustainable policies in place which I think is an important thing in an industry that could be considered wasteful. John Lewis and Next have a variety of designs that I think would suit children’s birthdays well, again using complimentary colours, Waitrose designs are a little more bold, but I was interested to see that they had an insect design as I really cannot find much in other stores. The giftwraps included in this moodboard retail from around 3.50 a roll to 6.00, with an average length of around 3m, which is not a bad price, but considering cheaper stores can sell 10m at even a pound or two sometimes, this is definitely in the middle of cheap and luxury, where in Harrods, a couple of metres on a roll was nearly eight pounds.
Overall I am happy with the design on my moodboards and feel much more confident about the direction my work will be heading, the trip to London definitely helped in terms of research images but I am currently in contact with someone at the Cardiff Museum hopefully to allow me to see into some of the archives of bugs, as even in London they did not have a vast amount out for viewing, and the ones that they did have out where quite difficult to view and photograph properly, presenting itself as more of an artistic structure than informatively showing you the different species on show.
I was looking forward quite a lot to the visit to London as I really wanted to go to the Natural History Museum particularly to look at insects and animals. I was quite unwell on this day but I knew I wouldnt have another opportunity to get back to London and visit the museum again in the recent months.
Sealife displays and Moon display
The first things we looked at were the sea creatures room showing a lot of the larger mammals that I couldnt see in the aquarium, and also an interesting moon display which was actually a very calming room so it was nice to walk through there. I was looking partilarly for insects, but the only room we really found was more aimed towards children, I managed to get a few photos in there for inspiration on shapes and colour, but overall I knew I had to look elsewhere, thats when I remembered the Darwin centre.
‘Creepy Crawlies’ room
There were some interesting displays in the Darwin centre, but again I expected more, but I expected that the research was being kept in the back as they were not really something for public display, they were collected for research purposes. I wish I had had the forethinking to contact the museum before the visit and try and arrange to get inside and see more, but on this day I contacted someone at Cardiff museum that I had worked with on a photography consultancy job and she directed me to a Dr Mike Wilson who I am currently talking to about coming and exploring the insects in Cardiff Museum archives.
Darwin centre displays
The range of creatures in the Darwin centre was really interesting and I think that the shapes are inspiring as to what patterns I could make out of them. I did not see so much in terms of colour which I was hoping for after seeing some of the amazing jewel beetle species online.
Darwin centre jarred species
Another wing of the Darwin centre is home to preserved species that are kept in jars, I think these are really interesting as they preserve the texture and colour of the species, and I love that through a glass window you can see that there are hundreds of these jars in storage with a range of species.
Insect Display in the Great Hall
As we were about to leave thinking we had found all that we could find, we came across a large glass display full of insects that I found very pretty. There was a great range of shapes and colours which I think are much more of what I was looking for, I could imagine these being very pretty patterns.
The gift shop
Even the giftshop here was interesting and provided some interesting cards as well as some books I found on insects with some vibrant illustrations of jewel beetles. This was the kind of colour intensity I was looking for and I think this is something to really think about for the upcoming module I think.
V&A Costumes and displays
I really love the range of costumes on display at the V&A as well as the fashion exhibitions, I thought this was a really nice end to the day to look around the costumes which in themselves have really interesting texture and techniques in them that could be useful for my own development.
We decided to visit Sealife Centre on our final day in Birmingham, while we drove up late on Wednesday night, and I spent all of Thursday in the Enactus training, we had some hours on Friday after checking out before we had to get going, so we walked five minutes over to the building.
Penguin display
I loved the penguins and all the different ways you could view them as you walked around their enclosure, and the fact you could see them swimming under the water too. They were clearly used to contact and were happy to put on a show when you were watching them which I loved. I think penguins and sealife could be translated into patterns for particularly young children as I feel like it could be very attractive to them.
Fish tanks
I loved the variety of fish and sealife on show, I feel like any of these could make really interesting patterns for children but also by creating them in my more patternwork style, like the shark in a previous post I did, I think these could be quite classy and make for a nice pattern for young adults as well.
Texture
I loved the range of texture I found within the tanks and habitats of the animals, the corals in particular were very pretty and I also found the lights in the tanks made really unusual colour combinations. This could be used to create an interesting background to the patterns and also blenders.
Crabs, Shrimps and Piranhas
I thought the more ugly or feared creatures could be something interesting to look into, crabs to me remind me of spiders which I do not like, although I am getting braver with handling them when I go crabbing. I could imagine an interesting pattern with crabs, especially as they can be very colourful and textured as well. The piranhas as well are given a bad and dangerous name, however I think they are very interesting looking creatures with the large teeth, but otherwise are quite normal looking fish. Again this could be an interesting collection showing off some of the weirder species that the sea has to offer.
Jellyfish
Jellyfish I think are capivating, they are so unique and weird and have this floaty weightless look about them. They can also be very brightly coloured and would make for a lovely pattern that I think could be used throughout a range of interior or stationary products, I think it is a very versatile design.
The 360 degree tunnel
I loved the 360 degree view tunnel, the sea creatures were completel surrounding us and there was such a variety in there. The old turtle in particular was beautiful, and I loved seeing the sharks as well.
Overall it was a really good visit and very useful for research whether I decide to go this way or not, I have ideas for things I could do in my future.
With my position as secretary of the Enactus society, I was asked to attend the Responsible Leader Accelerator training in Birmingham in September. This was the first time I had done something like this, or travelled so far by myself, so this was something I was quite nervous about. To help with my anxiety with the situation, my boyfriend booked a hotel, allowing us to go to Birmingham the night before, so in the morning I got ready and ate breakfast and then walked five minutes to the HSBC bank building where it was being held.
Booking into the event and getting started
We were signed up and shown to a lift that took us to the third floor, where again we were taken to various tables to collect our timetables for the day and then to a table where we were given some free things to help us with the day, such as notebooks, pens and chocolates, as well as some information on jobs in HSBC, which is a lot more than working in a bank I realised.
Welcome Talk
We began in a lecture theatre for a welcome talk, introducing us to the main members of the Enactus team who were there, some key people in HSBC as well as some of the other partner companies that were attending to be teaching workshops or giving talks.
Enterprise Rent-A-Car workshop
The first activity in my day was with Enterprise Rent-A-car, it involved an interactive session on business management, we were put into small groups and asked to imagine we were running one of the branches of enterprise, in charge of the dealership. We basically had to plan out our whole day, including assigning cars to customers and getting them to and from the cars at the right time, as well as answering customer queries and balance the work between the team of drivers. However, the phone would ring and problems would occur, firstly one of the drivers phoned in sick, which meant the remaining driver had a lot more to do in the day, which meant making some decisions, such as offering a better car or a discount if people had to be made late for whatever reason. While the other two members of my team worked on the timetable for the driver, I flicked to the back and thought I could get on with some of the customer queries as I thought we may run out of time to complete these if I left it any later. It was simple things like taking discounts for customers and pricing up other jobs, which actually provided us with a little more information to do with the car types that we could give to certain customers as well.
Overall we did well, it was interesting to hear how other groups handled the same queries too.
Afternoon Session
After a lunch break where I returned to the hotel quickly to eat, we were sent to the next session, I chose a panel discussion as there were six different people there talking so I thought I could learn quite a lot from this.
They talked about their business and personal lives and how they have overcome issues to build more resilience, which was very informative.
The whole lecture theatre returned and we were all split off into large groups, where we discussed what three qualities in a person and ourselves we think are most important to develop our future careers. I decided for myself as an art student that creativity was definitely one of the highest for me, as I do not think it just applies for creatives but in any industry in terms of problem solving and many other issues. Each group then did a short presentation on which word they chose, I immediately noticed how some of these people who had been to events like this before and working with Enactus societies for a couple of years were so charismatic and confident with public speaking, I felt like I was in front of a business man on the Apprentice, which is something I would love to be able to do myself.
I returned to the hotel and made some notes about the day, I was looking forward to the next day too, as we were so close to the Sealife Centre in Birmingham, we had this planned as I was considering fish and sealife for my module still.
During fresher’s week at Uni, I signed up to assist as a member of the welcome crew to help ease first years into uni life and show them around if they need anything. The training day was quite successful, I was nervous about the aspect of working in Cyncoed campus, somewhere I am not familar with being based at Llandaff. The first week started, I was placed at Cyncoed with a few others, in the main reception as this seemed to be the place where most people were walking through trying to find lecture halls or rooms, or coming to seek advice if they needed it by the main reception desk. The Izone is hidden down a corridor in Cyncoed however it is in the main reception at Llandaff, so some people had to be directed down there and others just wanted a general direction of where their rooms were.
Being new to Cyncoed with just my Ipad as a map, it actually took less time than I thought to get familiar with the blocks and buildings, knowing as well that we were working as a team, we managed to cover all the buildings between us and take people for small tours if they wanted to know more of the campus. The first two days were quite busy with helping out people, although Tuesday afternoon definitely got quieter as time went on, so the freshers fayre taking place on the Wednesday was something to look forward too.
On the Wednesday I also helped out on the Enactus stall, showing first years and others what the society had to offer. The fayre as a whole was successful and the welcome crew assisted with the setting up of the stalls and chairs, and also handing out the bags to freshers. The bags contained flyers and discount coupons and general information for new people in Cardiff, and these bags were being handed out in the hundreds. As an extra shift we were offered to join and complete the bag packing, around 15 different flyers to be put into each bag, this took around seven hours to fill all the bags needed to in the Centro bar in Cyncoed the Saturday before the fayre.
Bag Packing
We started with a method of packing by passing the single bag around and everyone adding a flyer or two, I went to the end of the line and I thought packing these back into the boxes would be quite an important part to ensure they were easy to access on the day, so this is mainly what I did for the morning, until we switched up the style of packing and instead created piles of the leaflets which were all put into the bag together, speeding up the process by quite a bit.
Thursday again was a quiet day as most of the people who were starting Uni had started on Monday or Tuesday and knew which rooms to attend now, I spent some time handing out leaflets to promote metfest the following day, and then we were instructed to help up up some decorations around the campus.
Adding Colour to Campus
The flags were added around most of the buildings where the events of Metfest were going to take place, the Zen bar was a key area, so we worked on using the streamers to create displays throughout. This was quite a fun day as it related more to creativity, although before the shift even begun I found people approaching me asking for rooms as late as this in the week.
Metfest came around and seemed to be a busy and active day, we were just positioned to welcome people to the various areas, I spent my time outside of the management building, where one of the main events seemed to be the cocktail making classes and the circus performers who were teaching students how to do some of the tricks.
Overall the week was a fun and interesting one, it was also the chance to get to know other people throughout the University and other courses, as well as some of the main members of the SU. This also helped me greatly towards my Cardiff Met Award hours of work which I was happy about, especially with it being work within the University.
As a part of the committee for the Enactus society, we were given some jobs over summer working towards the freshers fayre, these were:
Collect gifts for the hamper to give away to a lucky winner out of the people who sign up at the freshers fayre
Make a spreadsheet including questions for the sign ups to answer as well as providing their details for contact
Edit dates and times onto the posters to tell everyone where and when the welcome meetings will take place
Collections I managed to get by asking local businesses
I was first told to get in touch with someone at Enactus which could provide me with contact details for some of the partner companies with Enactus, such as Asda, Unilever and Bic. This turned out to not be possible, I sent a few emails anyway but I did not receive replies for a long time. I instead decided to try some of the local businesses near my house, this is something I have never done before and I was a little nervous, although after the first few places I got my ‘script’ straight in my head, to inform them exactly what I want for what, but not ramble on and bore them. The first few places were not successful, but not for negative reasons, a cupcake place close by simply said they get such a lot of requests that they have to limit themselves to a monthly charity budget and the September one had already been reached. As I continued down the road, I stopped being so picky with what I thought I wanted in terms of products, and just tried going into most places and seeing what they could offer me. This resulted in vouchers and bar tabs in a few places, but I also wanted to get some physical items that could fill an actual hamper. Pictured above are a few things I got from my first trip down the road and back, I was surprised that most stores were trying to be very helpful, such as hairdressers giving out free haircuts, a sports store giving some free tennis balls and even a corner store giving some sweet treats.
I tried co-op and was asked to provide the request in writing, so I did that that night and took it back the next day, they then gave a large amount of party food, such as some posh crisps, chocolates and drinks. I also had success in a sports and protein store, where I got a selection of protein based bars and snacks, as well as a water bottle and a shaker, which is a very good prize considering a lot of Cyncoed campus is based around sports.
The completed hamper
I was very happy with the collection, I think in the end the value of the basket was around 200 pound, including over 80 pound in vouchers. It was ready to go for the freshers fayre.
The freshers fayre
The freshers fayre was quite successful, we managed to get a good number of people to sign up and a lot of people interested in the community forest project which was great to see.
I am always looking for opportunities to continue my interest in 2D art and drawing as well as surface design and constructive textiles, I particularly like doing designs using patterns in a tattoo way almost, just more detailed. I think this is definitely my handwriting and something I plan to continue doing throughout my time in University.
Drawing with Patterns
I worked on the design and outline of the shark first, and then fit the background in where I thought it would look best, where the tail was not completely using as much space as the head was. I included a closer view of the shark as I wanted to show the full use of the patterns I use, including lines and shapes that occupy the space. I like how these work but I think in my work I need to experiment more with size and varying the size of the pattern to see if it gives any sense of depth with it which could be something interesting to try.
Penarth is a lovely little village between my home in Carmarthenshire and my parent’s holiday home in Cardigan, my boyfriend and I decided to go and spend the day up there, so this meant that we were passing through this village, so we met my family there for a walk before we went for a meal.
This particular place has been visited by my family since I was very young, the main feature being a small bridge that you can walk over, next to and under, with very large circles through it where we would regularly climb inside for photographs.
The Penarth River
I’ve always liked visiting this place, and the surface and texture of the rocks I think were really interesting. I think this could be something I could look into as I explore texture more during the module. I also like how the water has a pattern on the surface.
Looking vaguely into trends I have noticed an increase in bees over the past few years, so I started to think about how other insects could be used to create effective patterns. I know butterflies and bees have always been popular as insects to use on designs, but I thought about why not beetles? Or other insects so much like dragonflies, ladybirds or snails, I feel like they could all be made into attractive designs in their own ways.
A bumblebee on a flower
I thought this cute bumblebee on a flower was a pretty image, and could make a great placement motif. I think bees are currently overdone so I would like to look for different insects, but they were quite easy to photograph as they tend to stay in the same place for a little longer than some other fliers.
Butterflies
I found butterflies actually surprisingly easy to photograph when they land on fruit, as they do tend to stay still distracted. I liked the black ones as they are a change from the usual colour scheme of them, and the lighter one too which was giving me almost a marbled effect which I thought was also quite interesting.
Snails
I think snails are so weird and unusual, from the way they travel to the heavy shell stuck to their backs. I think they could quite easily make a very cute pattern for children and even patterns extracted from the shells could be used as a beautiful pattern in itself.
Tahlia Paige 