Disperse Dyeing and Knit

I've chosen the Knit / Manipulation option for this stage of my journey.  I've taken imagery from my family relics including crosses, chain mail and details from our coat of arms, as well as the family motto "lux tua via mea" (Thy light is my way).  Today I've been experimenting and printing onto my machine knit pieces creating some interesting shapes and patterns with disperse dyes.  I need to work more with the dyes as these tones and mixes are too dark for my chosen colour palette, but going in the right direction.  Most surprisingly was when these small experiments were pinned on the mannequin, I was really pleased with the initial results and were far more successful than I had anticipated.

'Experiences of a Journey

The theme of my brief is 'Experiences of a Journey: the place and the beauty of imperfection or damage'. We taken our little road trip this week to Mamble, ancestral home of my Blount family line. Visited Sodington Hall and the Blount Mortuary Chapel at Mamble Church in search of inspiration -  meet some of the family....

Nutcracker Samples

These are a couple of my final fabric manipulation and construction samples.  When I looked at the nutcracker on a large scale I found myself exploring the repeating lines of the nutcracker head, initially I looked to create this effect using fabric pleating, but found un-flattened pleats to be far more rewarding!  Although I worked with the big scale nutcracker components I also chose to utilise and repeat the simple oval shape too, through out all the pieces of work.

Planning and making a journey

Having now worked my way through the set of samples required for our first brief, I found myself in the four weeks allocated not moving from the the first item that really caught my interest, the vintage silver plated nutcracker!  The nutcracker head shape simple and oval with repeating shapes, I worked with the shape using scale as well as de-construction into it's integral parts to create my textile ideas.  These are my sketchbook ideas.....

Textile Design, Making & Application

Textile Design, Making & Application is the name of our new FdA assignment brief.  This is a twelve week project split into three mini projects, the overall theme is TRAVEL.  The first brief is based on the theme of 'Planning and making a journey' and we need to create textiles for interior fabrics and constructions for the home.  I chosen to go with the non print option of fabric manipulation and construction.  Have based my travel kit on my metaphorical journey, discovery of ancestral relics and my planning surrounds the bits and pieces we have in the house that were owned and belonged to family generations before us.

Portfolio Images

I really must get used to updating my blog on more regular basis, rather than every fortnight!  I've just been photographing my samples to support my CV application for my industry placement in April, and these are the images I have selected: