Self Initiated Project 2

Starting a second self initiated project in the midst of the practice unit wasn’t the easiest of tasks! Due to my success with my first brief, I found it difficult to call it a day and when I tried to put that project to one side and think of new ideas, everything was clouded by what I had explored previously. Due to the vast amounts of research I had gathered in my first project, I soon realised that there where actually several issues I had discovered, that I hadn’t had the opportunity to explore within my first project.

One of these ideas being the rise of feminism within modern society.

As with my first project, I spent the majority of the initial weeks gathering a body of research and visual evidence, to fuel the statement that I wished to make within my work. Coincidently at the time that this project began, there was a global surge of ‘Women’s March’ protest demonstrations, with a unified mission to stand together in solidarity and march for the protection of women’s rights, safety, health and families. This provided me with the most amazing source of inspiration and on 21^st January 2016, I attended one of the Marches happening in my home town of Shipley, which was an amazing day and experience (See Fig.1)

(Fig.1 Shipley Womens March 21.1.16)

As my first project had focused intensely on one product, I wanted to use my second brief as an opportunity to explore full garment designs, by visually creating a 8 look line up. As well as this, I also felt it important to explore a variety of fabrics throughout this project, due to denim being my soul choice throughout the last project. Fabric selection isn’t one of my strong suits, so I felt this project was a good opportunity to improve my skills and knowledge when it comes to fabric choices.  Due to finding my feet again in the print room within my first project, I wanted to continue exploring this process, as screen printing is definitely a technique I see myself working with in the future. Working with a varied selection of fabrics in the print room thought me many new things about the properties of materials, including what materials take best to pigment dyes and which materials cope better with more in-depth techniques such as flock and foil (See Fig.2)

(Fig.2 Self Initiated 2 Sampling)

During my research time I came across an image in a feminism history book of the Lumber Jills from the Second World War, a group of female forestry workers who took over the vital work load of the men who where away fighting in the war. This visual reference sparked the direction for my garment choices, exploring feminism related themes and outputs through masculine garments shapes and cuts. This project has been a great opportunity to work upon and improve my fashion illustration skills, I began a process off creating drawings and imagery work from my research and then translating them through an exploration into different garment compositions. Optimising my use of digital fashion illustration allowed me to play with multiple different styles, colour ways and compositions on a quick speed basis, something I felt very comfortable with as I reached the end of the project.

Final Line Up