Evaluation

At the beginning of the unit I set out to develop upon the skills gained in the Practice Unit, and continue with the processes used. My aim was to contextualise my work and put a professional portfolio together that I could present to potential employers, including commercially viable samples alongside bespoke samples that could be purchased separately for an interior textile context.

My visual research was developed from my Practice Unit concept (geometry within a city environment), adopting different perspectives of the City of Manchester with aerial photography. Through this initial photography I could clearly develop a colour palette, which helped me start the project more quickly than previous projects. Having a tutorial with Hannah Leighton-Boyce was beneficial as her perspective of my work differed to my tutor and she made me think differently about my practice. I feel my drawing has been more engaging after having this tutorial and has been developed further, and to a better quality than in previous projects.

After creating a variety of repeat prints for commercial use, and using flock to enhance the tactility of the samples, I put them together in a sample book which improved the quality of the samples and made me view my work in a professional light – I am really pleased with the outcome. This is also beneficial to have in my professional portfolio for clients/employers to look at to accompany the bespoke embroidery designs and is a way in which designers present commercial work within the Interior Textiles industry.

Editing out the pigment from the bespoke designs was one of the best decisions I made throughout this project, as they were overpowering the rest of the design and distracting away from more successful elements including embroidery. Replacing the pigment with flock improved the tactility of the samples and made them more suitable for my context. Furthermore, imagery that appeared as though it was Chinese lettering needed refining and toning down as this was not the focus of my project. Replacing the imagery with block shapes extracted from my drawings proved much more effective, and the scale of these shapes was more suitable for my context.

In respect of digital embroidery, using similar colours to the base fabric was advantageous as the orange burmilana disturbed the chevron weave of the fabric and integrated well into the design, embedding the orange foil back into the fabric. However, orange was not the correct choice on some of the fabrics as it was too harsh, so I substituted it for pink as a subtler option which worked better.

Finally, I’ve developed a more in depth understanding of the context of my work by carrying out more thorough research into the industry, discovering designers and retailers who create similar work to me. I’m clearer on the market level my work would sit within, and I’m confident that this degree was the correct one for me as it has allowed me to show flexibility to work in a variety of ways. 

MSoA Degree Show Preparation 2016

Creating large scale pieces for the 2016 Manchester School of Art Degree Show has been really rewarding, and seeing my designs at scale is very satisfying. I've embedded the foils and flock into the base fabric with digital embroidery to create a unique surface that is tactile. I'm looking forward to putting my show together and to see these pieces hanging in the space.

Contextually, I could see my designs being stocked by retailers such as Barker and Stonehouse (below), whose Winter 2015/16 catalogue had a great reference to my colour choices, and allowed me to envisage what my designs could look like in a home environment.

Refining

 After laying my samples out next to each other and reviewing the colour combinations of stitch, I decided that the orange burmilana on the woven blue fabric was too harsh and the paler pink worked better. I plan to combine pink with the subtler grey colour to enhance the finished design. 

My samples are beginning to come together as a collection with the combination of processes and colours. The block imagery works to convey my concept and the aerial drawings have helped me to realise this through textile mediums. The samples feel to have a sensitivity to them now and I've considered the fabrics and processes more carefully and refined my ideas.

Degree Show Plans

After careful consideration about the layout and colour of my sampling, I have edited out and selected colours that compliment the fabrics I plan to use for the Degree Show collection. The Degree Show samples will all be cohesive as a collection with the use of orange burmilana thread across them all, and using flock or foil as a highlight. I also plan to display a sample book of repeat commercial designs alongside the lengths of fabric as this is something I outlined in my learning agreement to achieve. Producing a sample book was very rewarding and made me view my work as a professional collection.

Subtlety

After producing drawings that depict 'scratchy lines', I produced screens to print with. Although the white pigment was effective, the black was too dominant on the samples, so I will edit all black out of future samples, including fabric and pigment. Instead, I will only use grey flock as a darker surface which would not be as harsh.

 

The sample above in my opinion is not well thought out and was more of an experiment of colour compositions. In future, I will use this motif sparingly as it is starting to appear like Chinese lettering, which was not the focus of my project. I will bring back some of the block shapes and use the above motif for foiling or flock to enhance the samples' tactility, like the samples below. 

The digital embroidery above disturbs the chevron weave of the fabric and appears to be knitted on top. I like the subtlety of the embroidery and the combination of flock and foil with it, so I will focus on subtlety in my next bespoke samples. I will also think more about placement of shapes on the samples and not go over the top with filling the fabric - less is more!

Drawing Development

Over the last few weeks I have developed my collection of drawings using aerial shots of Manchester and foil to create scratchy textured lines and add a different perspective to my work.

I've identified that extracting shapes from within images is a way in which I work best.

From these drawings I have worked with them in Photoshop to create screens for printing on return to the studio. I plan to work with A3 screens rather than A2 from an expense point of view until I have a clear idea about the imagery and designs that work best.

As I hope to work towards bespoke and commercial outcomes, I have experimented with half drop repeat designs too to demonstrate how they would work and show different colour ways.

If these designs were presented together in a sample book it would look professional in my degree show alongside other repeat designs and the bespoke pieces.

Large Scale Sampling

After printing with the pigments I mixed myself with the pigment binder, it was apparent that they weren't as strong as I had hoped. I added Opaque White to the colours, but this made them have a pastel tone. In future, when printing on similar fabrics, I will work with colours that I can make strong, such as black, orange and white on the blue linen, white on black polyester and black and white on orange polyester as the other colours appear washed out and cannot be made any stronger. To achieve a stronger colour, I would have to work on a white background fabric, or alternatively onto a natural fabric where the acid and reactive dyes can be used.

After having a tutorial with Hannah Leighton Boyce, she thought my drawings could be developed more. She suggested enlarging areas of my aerial photographs to develop into drawings that could be further abstracted as well as sampling on a smaller scale to test different techniques.

I plan to develop new screens for printing with after the Easter period from new drawings of enlarged aerial sections (see below).

Context

After looking at the work of Laura Slater, who has created work for retailers including Heal's, it made me consider compositions in Photoshop first before I start printing directly onto fabric. I feel my work is similar to Laura's, as we both use geometric shapes with lines to break up the block shapes.

When printing, I will further simplify my designs and adopt a 'less is more' approach and concentrate on adding textures such as flock and foil to enhance the samples and make them more suitable for an interior context. In previous projects, I have gone slightly overboard with filling the piece of fabric and not refined my ideas thoroughly.

Visual Research

From my initial visual research I have developed a colour palette from my photography which has been easier to achieve than in previous projects because I knew what I wanted to work with. This helped me when beginning my drawing as I would normally use random colours at first and develop a colour palette later on.

I have simplified and extracted information from my photographs and concentrated on mark making which I feel has been successful.

I will develop my drawings into screens for printing with and consider working with geometric shapes and combining linear qualities with this, which I believe will strengthen my portfolio of work from previous projects.