summary of the week

a good and bad week!
I loved Tuesdays lecture with Claudia. I've wanted to learn about illustrator since I was out on one of my placements. The graphics ladies used it all the time and I tried it a couple of times but it found it so hard. But now we've had a go I feel so proud of my first flat. I'm not too bad at drawing flats but I think this looks so professional. Another string to my growing bow! tehe!
On the other hand I've had a mare of a week with the rsa project! I feel like I'm being really lazy with it, but how can I be when I'm at my desk working at every earth giving moment!!! It was not going anywhere.......So on Tuesday night I started again! I edited my proposal and recreated my mood board. I feel I had too many influences, too many things to include so I hit a brick wall! Couldn't for the life of me think of any decent ideas!
I've now just got one main influence, which is butterflies, and I feel much better and confident about it. I want shape, style, print and professionalism to be the main image, but I want vibrant colour and a confident 'work hard play hard' attitude to shine through. I feel I can do this and provide lots of ways of accommodating all the essentials a woman would need on a city trip would need. I want to be able to start my toiling this coming week, whether its Monday or Thursday night.

my first go at illustrator!!!

my first go at illustrator, i am well impressed! i'm going to have to get this program for my laptop now!
I scanned my prints from my sketchbook and used them on my garments. Colours are out of there too.

a brand new week...

RSA - i worked on my sketch book majority of the day, up to the designing stage! i ordered some fabric last week off ebay for the project, and it can! yeay! but its only a fat quarter! i need more! i've emailed the seller, i'll just have to play the waiting game now! the print on its lovely, just the right colours i'm intending on using, but the fabrics not so brill. may have to look else where anyway.
Started some designs, am getting excited! I'm gonna try scan some of it all in to post in on my blogger space!
I intend to get my designs done this week so i can start toiling some of them up...

a productive day!

had a really productive day yesterday! monday got me down, as i was feeling really under the weather as it was, but my work was not moving at all, yet i seemed to be working at my desk all day!? bezar! anyway, yesterday i really got to grips with my tuesday lecture work. started to create my sketch book with influential and inspiring pictures and shapes for my final collection. redid my slide show as well. it fits much better now with my ideas.
rsa is going slow though. i did get my mood board done yesterday, but need to get my sketch book underway. i've got all the info, research etc its just strating the darn thing! white plank canvas thing! i dunno. i plan to get it sorted asap because i've got some good ideas for my capsule collection, so i'll crack my own whip! kinky!
tomorrows a new day...

I created a Slide Show! Check it out!

Get Your Own! | View Slideshow

theme board 1

this is the first theme board i've created on photoshop towards my final collection.
My ideas so far are to Marry the different style backgrounds of my grandparents. My nan is the english girl, my grandad the russian husband. I want to mix 50's style, floral prints, and shapes, with russian decadence & colour palette. I want to create garments that are similar, but worn in different ways can look completely different. They will be feminine and chic. Very contempory abd extremely desirable.
I am going to start sketching ideas into my sketch book, and experimenting with the shapes on thursdays patter cutting lecture. I will post my developments.

summary of the week...

am really chuffed, got selected to enter the elle/levi competition. not got to do much to my boards aswell. my tutors seemed to really like my boards to, so it's been a bit of a confidence booster. just needed aswell!!!
started my sketch book for the rsa, mood board halfway there too. proposal written. final collection research well underway, need to stick things down in my sketch book tho.
my jacket is coming underway in pattern cutting, it should be toiled up this week.
context, well yes, its ok, just doing what janets advised me too, gather as much research as possible then we will think of a title! sounds good to me!

picture perfect

went to my nan and grandads on saturday to route out some old pictures of them for my final collection project! my nan had me crawling through her tiny loft, i must have hit my head a billion times! ouch!! but it was quite productive as i got some lovely pics of them from their courting days and their wedding day. am going to redo my theme board before tomorrows lecture now i've got my pictures scanned in. lovely. even got some of when me dad was little (he looks a right nought!) tehe! lol!

Im HaVinG A LitLLe CrIsIS...

you know them days when dougts are flying high, well thats today! been survaying the projects and am in a pickle! I love my RSA design idea, its so me, and am so excited to start it! i wish it was my final collection, because i'm dougting that idea! i cant narrow it down, got to many images and its throwing me! what to do what to do!
I think so hardcore thinking is due on this. I really want to use my theme of english meets russian, but what style of english design i'm not sure about!??

ooow i kmow, i really wanted to show the mix of english and russian through me at the start, english girl russian name, but i might see about following it back further, to my nan and grandad. They are after all the reason for my name, as my nan was the english war child and my grandad was the russian imogrant escaping the war in russia and WW2. I could use the time period of there courting and marriage, and interperate the fussing of therewo different backgrounds in a love affair.
wow i can do something if i try!

just cant get enough....

why do i keep getting drawn to these images. They're tyically seaside english, but there is something about them that i just cant get enough of!

dolly jacket

love the shape of this jacket with its gingham trim by Kenzo ( s/s 06). the colour is what i would choose for my own collection, and i am fasinated with the quirkyness of the different buttons.

mixing themes

i found this example in Now Magazine, i instantly was drawn in to the jacket of kate moss. Its a mix of printed fabrics, which i thought was amazing. its eyecatching and a piece on its own. i would like to do something similar with my designs, mixing typically english household floral prints, maybe from the 50's or 60's, and a vibrant, strong russian colour palette.

russian dollies

i've found some modern examples of russian dollies in a home style magazine. i love the rich colours of the reds and pinks, and also the random, feminine, playful images painted onto the dolls. This also shows the example of my idea to play around with size. In my fashion head i could interperate this through layering garments/ fabrics/ exaggerate aspects of my designs?! who knows yet...

can it hurt??!

i was thinking, as i was researching the rsa and mulling over todays lecture, would it hurt to do a menswear collection as well to coenside with my womenswear collection? the best could be submitted and the other tweeked for my portfolio? i know its more work but if i could do it, it would give me something different for my portfolio. can it hurt?

ooww information overload!!!

today was a very informative day! i loved it though. most things that i wanted answered were answered. am well chuffed. am really excited about this rsa project too for some reason. talked my idea over with ann and she was pleased with it. I plan to do a womenswear capsuale collection for the urban sophisticated brief. I am going to use butterflies as my main influence. For example for the shapes, colour slurges, pattern, etc. it will be aimed at someone like myself i think, a young professional! I want it to be highly desired though, a designer piece, expensive. i read an article in elle or vogue about how high street fashion has become like fast food. its fast fashion. no one saves for the ultimate designer piece any more. that piece that you can keep for years, that can be worm over and over again. thats what i want my pieces to be. highly desirable, highly feminine, highly stylish, highly versitle!
went and researched in the library this afternoon, was quite productive as i may have now solved my context problem, but some hardcore reading is need yet, so i'll keep you posted.

summery of the week

what a week! am so trilled to be back at uni again and starting the new projects! the only one thats freaking me out is context!!!!
5000 word essay and a 12 page evaluation, sorry reflective journal, but hey really whats the difference?! Am really not sure about it all, my subject is really bugging me as i really am not sure what to do (topic wise). My title and proposal were to do with the ergonous zones and if they exsist any more, but i'm not sure it interests me enough to be able to write that much else about it. think janet will be pulling her hair out with me! opps!
Loved thursdays pattern cutting session! feel like i'm in my element! it was the quickest 3 hours of the week though! it fills me with confidence that we have that session to test out designs and ideas we have for our final collection. its great practice!
am also trilled about the elle competition, got through, and will be making the effort to get it sent off in time. bring on friday!
lots of work to be researching so better go......rsa, final collection, elle, CONTEXT :-(

first proper entry!

well what a day, am so excited about having a blog! so right lets scribble my thoughts out on todays lesson....
i was a little disappointed in the final collections from last year. They all seem a little outrageous, which is not the route i myself was planning on taking, but i was reassured when Claudia said we can basically do what we want. So as long as that stays true i feel a little happier. Also i was a little gutted that there are only 14 places for graduate fashion week!!!!! eak! There's going to be a lot of competition seen as we are such a hugh 3rd year group this year!

collection wise though my initial ideas are for a womenswear collection with the surprise of a single menswear outfit at the end. i want a collection that is feminine and sexy in a quirky kind of way. My initial idea is to use Russian dollies as my main theme. not so much looking at Russian folkwear but using the doll shape, playful nature, and rich Russian colour palette and mixing it with a very household English style. Mixing English house hold prints with Russian glamour, rich materials, detailing, and colour. My collection will be full of laying garments, extremes of fitted and oversized garments, etc. I'm rambling now.....
My aim is to create a desirable collection that's tasteful, clever, quirky and expensive (£££) tehe! xxx

First Day

Oooh how exciting my first ever blog! I am a blog virgin no more! bring it on x x x