First Impressions

This was our first project of second year. Based on Rococo stucco and coving I began to design my collection. I paid a visit to my grand-uncle's coving and plasterwork store. Pleating and draping are the main techniques used in the collection inspired by the shapes of the plasterwork.

These our my boards for the project.

wow busy bee!

Ok so during the past few weeks I have been working a lot a lot a lot in the restaurant and havent had too much time for my rojects which really stresses me out! Buuuuuut I am about quarter way through remaking the sandra backlund piece above! I loved this piece as it has so many techniques involved to create a beautiful simple garment! I'm making it in a similar colour but it has more of a ruby feel to it! I had to get extra long knitting needles made for me to make it but hopefully it will be worth it when its finished! I havent decided what I want to do with fabric yet! I need to consider certain things in my choice but hopefully I'll have a few more things done by the end of the Summer!

hello crochet crowd!

Hi there! well over the past fortnight I have been teaching myself crochet from an amazing needlework book I have! I didnt make a garment or object but I did practice by making swatches upon swatches! now the hook I used was very small to the crochet I did was very intricate buuuuuuuuut I have 13 crochet hooks of all different sizes in the post to me at the moment so hopefully i'll get to make a piece before the summer is out! I did like doing crochet I have to admit and for a knit lover I thought that might be the case so I'm happy it is! I have also been practising drawing different figures and will hopefully do more over the next fortnight along with my knitting practise in which I hope to make the hat I designed during ranking and also remake a SANDRA BACKLUND PIECE!!!!!!!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAAH I'm so excited I hope time is on my side! :-D! and on another note I would like you all to welcome my brand new mannequin into the world of fashion! I will try to put up more pictures next time Im on my blog looks very dull!
Bubye!

Knitting machine!

Okay, I missed my last update again! I know I'm terrible! My knitting machine fortnight was a bit strange it was hard for me to work the machine going on the instructions I had but towards the end of the first week I had the basics ok and in the second week I tried to work two colours which I found out is extremely hard when you only have one aerial! So a replacement is needed badly! I didnt make anything on the knitting machine yet but I do plan on going back to it and making a garment or something simple before the summer ends! Wow the holidays are actually flying by! Crochet fortnight is half over! Talk soon!

Patterns!!

Heya again! Well I was thinking today, why don't I show you what I already have made from patterns I bought and adapted! Bear in mind these were made for me and family and friends and are very basic!

Ok so the first one was the first dress I made, a pair of shorts and top were made before these but I cant find them to put them up and I dont think they were very appropriate anyway!:-) I made this simple dress when I was 15 and still love it to this day, it is so comfortable and easy to wear and a good dress to learn from as it contains 4 darts and a zip and hem!!

This skirt is a wrap skirt with four buttons to secure it, it was my first time executing flat pleats and trying out my buttonhole function on the machine for an actual garment when I was 16 I think!

I adapted the above skirt pattern to make a skirt for my two year old sister from the excess fabric! I adjusted the pattern to fit her height and put elastic in the back to make it more comfortable and appropriate for a young child. I also added cute little pig and flower buttons and used the zigzag stitch to decorate the skirt for a young little girl!

This dress was a big step up from the previous as it was the first lined garment I made and also contained boning and a LOT of gathering! it looks a bit like a sweet wrapper which I love and the duchesse satin fabric was so easy to use it was a blessing! The gathered belt and pink bow are attatched as part of the dress and are included in the fabric that had to go behind the zip so it wasnt an easy zip to put in but still works to the day!:-)

This dress was one I made for my debutante ball! I wanted a dress that emphasised the cut and make of the dress rather than a mad patterned one or one ovcerloaded with diamontes! While the skirt was easy to make joining four sections of material and gathering them for both lining and satin and hemming them, the top was a little more difficult as the from the inner bust there goes a strap which extends to the outer shoulder and directly attatches to the waist at the back, where as the outside of the bust extends a strap that meets at the back of the neck and from this material at the back of the neck two additional straps join to the waist of the dress also! It sounds a lot more complicated than it was to make but I was happy with the way it turned out so I was happy on the day.......and the day after I shortened it to wear it all the time ;-)!

This black dress was an  adaptation from the above red dress pattern lacking a few of the straps and alot simpler but just like my friend wanted it! the customer was delighted so so was I! :-)

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Sorry about the quality of some of the photos, a lot of these clothes dont fit me anymore:-( so I was unable to retake photos of them on the body!

SUMMER!!!!

Well hello there everybody!
I meant to get on this earlier in the Summer with my P.O.A. but time got away from me so I am now doing 2-in-1!!!:-)!!!
I've divided my Summer into two week slots dedicated to a something new or old I want to work on! There include learning Carrickmacross lace, working on my new knitting machine, learning how to do crochet, completing a knitwear piece I designed during one of our projects, and working on needlepoint and embroidery work. These two week sessions will be accompanied by continuous work on drawing and research on fashion illustration.

My first two weeks were dedicated to Carrickmacross lace! My Daddy dearest is from Carrickmacross and my Granny is one of the few people learned in the fine art so she has agreed to pass on this beautiful lace technique! Everybody I met in my two week visit to Carrickmacross was delighted to hear I was learning in their town's famous lace making skills! I first met with a man Mr. McCabe who was only delighted to show me his collection of traditional Carrickmacross lace patterns and was brilliant in helping me understand more about lace. My Granny and I then ventured to the lace gallery where we witnessed lacemaking in process and absolutely stunning pieces! After Kate Middleton wore a wedding dress which features an incredible amount of Carrickmacross lace the gallery has  been inundated with questions which happened also when Lady Diana had it on hers also!

I went home that day with an avid hunger to start the lacemaking and that I did!

It's a very slow process but a bit like knitting it is very relaxing and therapeutic and before I knew it my image of the Claddagh ring was underway by means of the regular stitch, loop stitch, pops, cobweb, The Dot and I learned many more stitches along the way!

I hope someday I'll have the chance to incorporate Carrickmacross lace into my designs.....Scratch that I do not hope I will, I will make it happen!

Talk soon I'm off to play knitting machine!

first post in ages so sorry lads!!!!!!!

Hello ladies and gentlemen,
Well this is the first post I've put up in ages so I have loads to tell ya!
Well during ranking my cocoon project went well and my garment, although a shocking green colour it was fun to make!
Over Easter I had loads of fun with my swatching project based on the environment around me and fortunately the techniques and sources I used fed in to the striping project really well as they both included contrasts of organic and structural techniques as I based my striping project on looking through the gaps of man-made fences and railings  to the nature behind it.
Nicole,
Pictures will be there soon as I can fix my camera!:-)

Fashion Research Project

Enclosure:
For the word 'Enclosure' I chose the words cocoon, cage and locks from my mind maps and researched some very interesting imagery from them.
From the word cocoon came some amazing delicate natural textures and naturally vibrant colours. I also found some interesting cross references including sculptures which gave an even wider range of imagery.

For the word cages I researched zoo imagery and caged animals. From this I found a major contrast in every manner between the animal in the cage and the cage itself including differences in texture, colour and shape.

I also researched the word locks and focused my research on locks on doors. This research brought a lot of interesting man-made shapes to the projects.

Decay:
Under the word decay I researched the topics Microbes, Rhizopus and Plastic.

Microbes brought very interesting shapes and some interesting textures into the project.
While Rhizopus brought a different set of interesting shapes and some amazing colour schemes into play.

For the word Plastic the main attraction was the dynamic shapes and textures it showed.

Tribal:
For the word Tribal I looked into the themes; the Maori tribe and their Moko tattoos, The Native Americans and their Petroglyphs and the Amish and their simple nature and complex quilts.
The Moko tattoos showed some intriguing shapes and patterns and also I liked the contrast that occured between the dark lines and lighter skin.

The Petroglyphs brought a range of simple diagrams with very nice outlines to the project.

The Amish brought geometric shapes and sharp colours with their quilts while their lifestyle carried a simplistic theme.

Electric:
In this part of the project I researched circuit boards, lightning storm clouds and plugs.
The circuit boards featured some nice geometric shapes while I also liked the continuous like between them.

The lightning storm clouds showed an array of amazing colour stories and some interesting negative spaces.

In plugs the colours and tangled nature of the wires created interesting shapes.

Memories:
In memories I chose only to focus on my own memories, in particular the earliest memory I have of my Dad puching me aroung in a wheelbarrow full of teddy bears.
This focus on teddy bears showed mainly a range of different textures.

From all of these themes I think I will take the delicate texture of cocoons,

 the bright colours from the storm clouds

 and the dynamic shape possibilitis from either the plastic or the microbes

 to create a very interesting new design.

VisCom 2

Hello! Well today is the end of the Typography project. My three final concepts included writing the word Structural with the cement of a brick wall. I chose a red brick wall as the cement is a different colour and can be seen more clearly, I chose to write the letters witht the cement rather than the bricks as the cement is the actual structural part and without it the bricks wouldn't have a strong structure. Another concept was writing the letters to spell out the word on the concrete beams of a multistorey car park. I chose a multistorey car park as the structural beams are always seen in them where as they are hidden in other buildings. My final concept was a 3D piece. It was a miniature pre-cast concrete beam. Pre-cast beams are reinforced with structural steel and so my representation of the word was creating the letters out of the reinforcing wire fromt the clay I made it from. One of my pieces from my sketchbook is one of my favorite things I have done for the project, its a lettering designed to look like steel "I" beams which are crucial to structure in buildings or scaffolding. I also made a little piece from thick wire, which is created from stacking the letters on top of eachother to create a structure that is strong enough to hold things. Mostly in my sketchbook I played around with rendering and postioning the word in different ways to try and make them look structural as well as say it. Hopefully next week will be as fun! Nicole.

Visual Communications!

Hello, this is my first week of visual communications and so far I'm liking it! On Monday we got an introduction to Typography and our project with both Patricia Green and Mary Nagle. I got the word "structural" adn set off to make a mind map and thumb nails to suit the wor. On Tuesday there was a lecture on lateral thinking and the scamper method, as I missed all of day Tuesday because of illness I'm going to research the Scamper Method and try to catch up on the work necessary! I hope it all goes well, wish me luck! Nicole.

deadline!

On Wednesday Pamela taught us how to use the sewing machines so that we could sign a health and safety form and of course to learn how to use a sewign machine, I already have a sewing machine so I didn't find it too difficult!
On Thursday we started pulling our favourite designs from our sketchbook and putting them together to create a final collection. I did this and chose the colour scheme Iwanted to use from one of my colour stories!
Well today is the deadline day, I have my final collection ready and am ready to hand it in, I just have to check if it's organised well again! This discipline has been a lot of work but also a lot of fun! Wish me luck!
Nicole.

Plus...

I also am trying to recreate some of my paper mannequin pieces with the three different weights of fabric and make new ones, I'll have pictures of those up as soon as I can find time! Bubye again!

this week!

Well this week is going to be very busy! I have a good few designs for the different body shapes done with both my original shapes and the shapes I got from working on the mannequin! I am now looking back on those designs, adjusting the scale and trying to see if they will work on both other parts of the body or as a full body piece! I like doing this as it is making me concentrate on my designs and see which ones work and which ones dont really! I hope to have loads done by the end of the week in all areas, my designs, my colour stories, my research and crossreferencing and my contectual notebook! Busy, busy, busy...I love it! bye for now. Nicole.

Fashion!!!!!

Okay I haven't updated ye on my print elective yet but I wanted to start my fashion one! I started fashion on monday and decided to base my project on umbrellas! They are an everyday product with extraordinary drawing capabilities! using one umbrella I got loads of analytical drawings as the shape of the umbrella changed every time you opened it another inch or changed the direction you looked at it! Following some research I also found some crazy umbrellas of different shapes and sizes! I'll put some of them up on this for ye to see! On Tuesday we had some mannequin time with Pamela and a colour workshop with Liz! The mannquin time was brilliant I got to see how a flat pattern piece could totally transform when moulded and placed on the mannequin in different ways! The colour workshop was loads of fun too! Colour stories are really fun to make while also being beneficial to the design process! Today we are doing a drawing workshop with Phillipa, we are learning how to draw the important curves and creases in fabric through line drawing and different materials to make our sketchbook drawings more realistic and interesting. After lunch we are photocopying and collaging shapes and colours onto the drawings we did earlier! It should be fun! Loving fashion, Nicole
P.S I'm only putting up a few of the mannequin pictures, there's far too many it'd fill up the internet!:-P!