Evaluation

This project has been a great learning curve. I feel I have learnt a considerable amount about the way I work, and my style of working. Exactly halfway through this project, I realised that my practice may not have been going in the direction I wanted it to be, mainly due to how much I missed illustrative drawing. This meant shifting from weave to print on a slightly crazy whim. I didn’t initially use any of the work I had produced for weave, which instantly hindered my time management.

I developed my initial theme from the live brief ‘Tigerprint’; floral designs for gift wrap. This then became the whole subject to both of my projects. I originally planned on having two completely separate collections, where one would consent to the gift wrap live brief, and one would cross over to weave and be woven on the Jacquard loom. This would have been perfect in enabling me to experiment with illustrative image in weave.

 

 

My development processes took me on a experimental journey where I tried many different techniques. These included drawing from live flowers, painting, photographing in florists, collage and flower pressing. This engaged me again with my love of drawing and photography. I took a great leap when deciding to take print due to my lack of technical skills. I forgot that I did not have to combine all of this visual research and struggled in narrowing down my experimentation. This is definitely something to work upon in the future.

 My final tutorial with Alex made me realise that I wasn’t expected to have a final collection (mainly due to my late decision to change , but to just develop design ideas. He asked me to create design ideas in two different colourways. The second colour palette being taken from my initial weave project. This finally made a nice cross over of projects, even though the theme was entirely dissimilar.

Overall, I have created designs for two very different contexts. One for interiors, which has always been my passion, and one for TigerPrint (live brief) gift wraps. If I was to develop these design ideas, I would have liked to draw and collage more to create more of a hand drawn collection, (after all, that was the reason I decided to change paths). I am most happy with my interiors collection, mainly due to the colour selections and simplicity of design. In terms of context, I can visualise my designs in commercial high street shops such as John Lewis, Debenhams, B&Q, aimed at the younger market that have interest in bold, bright and statement design. I can see my designs being versatile enough to cross over for wallpaper and fabric for upholstery, (swatches attached to samples, Heavy Cotton in Cotton Duck White).

 

 

I don’t feel like this project has been successful in terms of outcome, and I’m not entirely happy with what I have produced, however it has been successful in terms of realisations. Doing this has made me recognize I am more suited towards weave, even if I have only scraped the surface of print. Working on a constant flat surface doesn’t fit my way of working, instead I enjoy yarn selections, textures, and the ‘making’ of an actual fabric. I have opened my eyes to different ways in working in weave, whether this is illustrative drawing at the start of a project, and careful selection into translating these into weave, or working on the Jacquard loom to construct to patterns I design. I really like the idea of combining print with weave (specifically screen printing), which is a much more hands on way of working.