Putting the final nail in the coffin...

'A successful man is one who makes more money than his wife can spend. A successful woman is one who can find such a man.' - Lana Turner 

What another week it has been!! I have been busy with Art Foundation, soon my blog about my Art and Foundation studies will be coming to an end and I am saddened by this as this past year has flown by and what a year it has been with high and lows with a lot of laughter along the way! My dear reader chums! 2 weeks approx till the end and I don’t want to leave! Previously in my life, I thought Florence was in France. Now that was awkward! Also I have found a love for sleeping which is not normal as I can sleep 8 hours but now I sleeping more! I am lazy! It is half term! Horrrah! I have been sorting out the final stages of my foundation studies with final drawings and research before I make the final piece. I am going to be making a dress that will represent the idea of the death of Haute Couture with the use of disposable fashion and coffins to represent its death.  Bike is still hiccuping which is very quickly becoming the bane of my life as it runs fine for 20 minutes and then decides to hiccup and cut out at the lights. I don’t get why it does it. Aaaaaa well. We move on. The book at the top of the page is a new book that I was bought by my kind friend and I love it so much! It is representative of mystical creatures. 

The mood board. This mood board has taken me 2 days of work to get together and produce as I was struggling with the use of imagery and the balance of fashion and objective objects. Initially I was criticized for the page being too black and white so improved this with the introduction of black and red permanent markers. This has enabled me to look at the ideas of shapes and structured nature of the dresses and coats. I also have put on fabric samples onto the board as it brings the 3D nature to the piece. The mood board is done for inspiration with the use of crossed bodied bondage for the top half of the body and top of the dress. the point of a mood board is to give me ideas and show where my ideas are coming from and how my mind is working when it comes to the production of the final piece. I found producing the mood board hard as I had finalized the final piece in my head which meant that there is alot of certain objects on the mood board, e.g circle skirts. Overall I am extremely happy with the piece as it represents everything that I need it to and this has helped with my design  process as it pushed the dress design forward.  

This piece shows the construction of the crochet coffin that I have wanted to try and create. I have found creating the coffin hard as it means increasing and decreasing stitches which I found hard as it meant creating consistency on either side of the increase. The decrease was harder as I felt like I was creating stepping stones down rather than a graduated decrease on an angle. The idea of the coffin is to create the death of Haute Couture through a piece of work rather than having the message lost as the audience guess what it's about and not being able to distinguish what it is about. The message needs to be obvious and the use of the coffin creates the easier way of displaying the symbolism. I really like this piece as it well constructed. I want to put wax over the top as it would display the cracks in the Haute Couture work. Bin bags shows the ideas behind the disposable fashion and the creation of a new fabric. Overall I am very happy with this experimental piece and will be involved in my final piece. 

Bag in the bin to the mannequin…

‘Ooooooo bapple’ – The minions.

Feels like a while since my last post!! Looking back… It was only last week! As you know my dear reader chums, I do try to keep up with the blog and keep you all in the know with regards to my whereabouts, being nosey are we? Rude.  If this is your first read of my blog then hello to you! So much has gone on over my time on Art Foundation but primarily my FMP and you have missed out on so much. Previously in my life I realized that Bob Marley is actually dead which shocked most as it should be known that he is no longer with us and hasn’t been for many years. Finally, Eurovision, what a spectacle and what a winner!! Inspirational.com. (not a website, naughty). This past week I have taken my eye off the ball and haven’t been working to my full potential and delivering on my work as my motivation has dropped considerably which means that no as much work has been done and my work seems to be dwindling. My bike decided to have a hiccup also and took it to the garage but like all things there is nothing wrong with it and runs like new. Good.

This past week I began looking at artists and designers that have done and looked at bin bags as a way of creating Haute Couture and came across Gareth Pugh once more as he has coincidently used bin bags to create a couture collection. Gareth is renowned for his works that go down the catwalk for art purposes rather than for the commercial sense and value. His pieces are astounding and represent the idea of throwaway couture and question the concept of what a garment is and has become. His use of strong lines that influence the body shape and dominate the catwalk with the striking use of layered crossed over techniques with the flared strips that create the dimension and prowess. The drape and hang of the garment is the main feature of the dresses and this is what delivers the atmosphere and sophisticated drama that is present throughout. He has focused on the ideas of the pear shape with a bigger waist and smaller bust which forces the dresses to flare out and float down the catwalk.

I feel inspired by this collection as it shows the possibilities of the humble bin bag and the idea of creating something beautiful from them, the ideas of disposable fashion and bringing it to the attention of Haute Couture.

This dress is a mild response to Gareth Pugh but is more of an experimental piece that enables me to look at the positives and negatives of the creating a dress out of bin bags. This dress was created from 4 bin bags that have a head hole cut out of them and then draped over a mannequin before being shaped to create a couture garment. I found creating this garment hard as I had no pattern and was going purely off my artistic fashionista flare. I have a love for the fish tale dress and wanted to create this on my own dress, I firstly had to fit the dress to the mannequin by taking in the waist and creating a bust. To create the fish tale I needed slimming silhouette that went down to the knees and the only way of doing this was to curve the material round the mannequin so that the bottom flared out. Overall I am extremely happy with the dress but it took a while to get there as it was a blank canvas and I had to determine my own darts and the couture nature of the dress. I have previously created a paper dress that was done with the same concept of a single sheet of material but I came out with a completely different outcome which shows that material can determine how you interpret a dress. I processed to rip the dress off the mannequin to show the ideas of disposable fashion and how this is killing the industry of Haute Couture.

You'd look good in a bin bag... so they say.

The bin bag dress...

'I need to get all this done...' - Olivia Tillston 

Another week has passed and you know what my dear reader chums, it has been a mixed week, I have had my ups and downs and even felt confused about the direction that my work should be going in. This past week I went to another car boot sale and continued the vintage search, I came out with a couple of pieces for University from mixers to briefcases. In terms of work I became confused when talking with a tutor which through my off and made me question all the work I had done so far which halted my tracks for a few days because Dan came to the rescue. Praise the Lord for the Mr Daniel Crowe. Sitting down with him enabled me to look through my work, reanalyse where my work was at and can go and put me back on the tracks to what I want to deliver in terms of communicating the final outcome of answering the question… Is Haute Couture dying? Is it being reduced? Or is it continuing? I realized there is no right or wrong answer to this question and is purely down to personal opinion which needs to be backed by a final piece.

This formed crocheted bodice formed the basis for my dress and is a form of experimentation; the bodice took me 16-18 hours to complete as it required me to extensively crochet over a prolonged period. I am really happy with the piece as the crochet is even but it could be more consistent and tighter. Doing this enabled me to play around with different materials and how they reacted to constant crochet and the speed into which I could crochet with it. To progress my work I want to play around with other materials and different overlaying techniques. I kept the materials and pattern the same to deliver consistency. I found maintaining the tightness of the wool hard as I was doing it on a mass scale and also creating a hoop the right size for the mannequin. Overall I am extremely happy with where this is going and has gone. The dress from the back is untidy as I have had to pull it in as it was too big and had to be pinned to bring the crochet in to fit on the person.

This piece is the final experimentation with the crocheted waistband and skirt. The shirt was created based on the idea of the circle dress where you cut a circle for the waist and a circle for the skirt which helped created a simple flow to the dress and meant that I could add pleats and cut into the dress if I wanted. The waistband has been created and has been done to add a statement piece and to bring the skirt together with the bodice. As this was experimentation I have been able to look at the positives and negatives of my work. The skirt was simple to create as it as simple as sticking bin bags together and then cutting the circles out, however I required a bigger space than I had to do it and I found it a struggle to get it all stuck together and cut out. The bags flow well and could be seen to be formal wear that could be seen as glamourized trash. The waistband could be refined with a smaller crochet hook which would tighten the crochet. Would this work and be viable in the time I have left? I will have to do some experimentation to find out what works and how it is relevant towards my project. Purpose behind the bin bags you may ask… I want to show how disposable fashion can be brought together with high end Haute Couture. 

Crochet away...

Wooden dolls.. 

Every little helps... - Tesco.

Vintage myth - Costs the earth to buy.

WHAT A WEEK!! This past week has flown by but sadly not much has happened apart from the obvious crochet which is still flowing. Who actually reads my blog? This has taken my curious mind into wonders this week. If your reading my blog right now, thank you so very much my dear reader chums and I am delighted to share your company on this fine day or maybe it's your evening. Whatever it is thank you for taking the time to read about the nonsense that I lay before you.Thank you sir and thank you to you please as I am going to enlighten you upon my doings over the past week. If you haven't read the rest of my blog post then RUDE! Get to it immediately. Go on. I am joking I am. This week has been purely about crochet and research. What could be the reason that Haute Couture would die?  To pass the time whilst doing Crochet I have been watching a couple of films, they have made me weep, teaches me for watching sad films. Reasoning behind the wooden dolls picture? I will tell you for why... I am making mock ups for the final piece and I have been using the wooden dolls to model my samples on.

This was my first attempt at making a crochet dress and has been constructed purely for experimental purposes and the main reason behind the construction is to get to grips with the idea of joining threads together to form another material. I invented my own stitch which was quad-crochet which was triple + double which formed a longer chain, it takes longer but is rewarded as it produces results quicker. Using a small doll enables me to produce a piece that fits a lot quicker than if I produced a life size piece. It doesn't fit it particularity well as I had never measured it against the doll first hence the cocktail stick in the back. If I was to produce it again then I would message the waist against the crochet. Overall I was very content with my first attempt at producing a crochet skirt. Would I do it on a big scale? Maybe not as it would require a massive crochet hook to get something of that scale to work and would require multiple crochet. I may  go onto attempt 10x crochet to produce a long piece.

This is my second attempt at a crochet skirt and this time I measured it against the dolls waist but I had to make it slightly wider to fit over the hips of the doll or it would never of fitted because there is no elastic or pull on the centre of the skirt so making it wider than the waist enabled me to get it on easier. I did a gradual retention starting with Quad to triple to single, double and then a single crochet to form a frill at the bottom. I love the graduated effect as it creates an elegant silhouette and shows the different knots within the crochet handbook. Doing this has enabled me to see how they work together with the use of different ways to crochet. Overall I am pleased with the way it has turned out and will progress my work by creating further pieces of crochet. This piece was done on a bigger wooden doll to enable me to create the bigger skirt. Doing these smaller experimental pieces has enabled me to see how long it takes to make them before I would consider making bigger pieces and has enabled me to at thicker and thinner wools. The thinner wools on bigger needles create a loose crochet which I find hard as you have to keep the tension high in your hand but on the needle it has to be loose so becomes an almost contridiction and your hands and mind get confused because your doing one thing but are supposed to be doing another. It's like having a hot drink on a hot day. You do it because your supposed to but your mind tells you otherwise. (Maybe not the best analogy.)