Monday 25 February 2013

Made in Jesmond





We have recently been working on designs for a shop called Made in Jesmond, which is in Jesmond, Newcastle upon Tyne. It sells vintage goods and items created by individuals using vintage or recycled materials.
As part of this module we also have to create a brand for the items we are producing.
I am using the name of this blog as my brand name and this is my logo.
I have found a company who will use my image and text to create two rubber craft stamps. I will use the stamps with coloured inks to make my garment tags and stamp gift bags too.
I chose to find my inspiration, and colour story from the 1950's. The trend I am using is Retro Botanicals, I always seem to fall back on the plants I love for my designs.
I also wanted to recycle or upcycle old fabrics and clothes which I can never bear to throw out. For a long time I have had strips of fabric wound into balls in our loft ready to make a hooky mat and thought it the ideal thing to make for Made in Jesmond, it sits with their ethos so nicely.
From my drawings of an Allium seed head I have created a design, and had to crack on with it quickly as we don't have much time. Hooky mats take forever to make. Here are some photographs of the progression.




We are much further on with it now but still a long way to go.
We had a meeting with Yve from Made in Jesmond and I got the impression she wasn't sure how the mat would go, and when quizzed she admitted that Tea cosies and Coffee pot covers were what she had been asked for. I have considered making lap top covers.
So I have been continuing my development and have created these applique designs today, just trying out some styles and techniques. By bed time though I intend to have a pot cover of some description made!







Catch Up


Life has been pretty hectic and the time has come to catch up and add the work I have done this college year.

The work below was our first module after the Summer  break.
We had to create garment fronts. I have chosen to use the trend, Subterranean.
While on my holidays on Kos I loved the pebbles on the beach and used some of the drawings I did of these pebbles. I also had taken photographs of the stratum in the rocks while on holiday in Cornwall a couple of years ago. These were combined with drawings I did of fossils shaped like a heart.
This is my mood board below, using fashion photographs, pictures from magazines, my own photographs and pebble drawings.



Once I had created my design motifs in my sketch book I decided to tie dye and dip dye some fabrics, see one below.



I used parts of my drawings of pebbles and manipulated them in photoshop, adding colour. I love the scale of the first one below  and the second one I can imagine on a t-shirt.
The third photo shows the garment front.




 Here I have screen printed this design onto some polyester satin and then hand stitched on the pieces of pink silk. 


 This is our favorite, the dip and tie dyed fabric, screen printed with a pebble design and then hand stitched into with a fine running stitch and some satin stitch.


Not the best photographs I'm afraid, but I feel the whole collection is quite 60's looking and lend themselves well to a simple shift dress.