UNIT X CONCLUSION

From the beginning of the project I knew that I wanted to create a product, rather than a body of samples. I have seen the final year of University as quite a challenge, mainly because I feel that we are told to determine where we believe our practice will fit into our future career. Although I adore weave and have very much enjoyed my time as a weave, my ultimate goal is to become a primary school teacher. Because of this I have found the task of contextualising my own work very difficult. This has been my main obstacle throughout Unit X. 

I see my work as one off high end pieces with a large range of "customers". I normally create the product and then once it is finished, try and decipher who that product is for. 

I believe that having a live brief in the practice unit focused my work well, and the lack of (dare I say) purpose has led me slightly astray this project. To excel, setting myself small specific briefs would have helped me to focus on a potential client and build a substantial collection aimed towards one price range and one client - if you will. 

I am very confident in my technical knowledge gathered over the past three years studying weave, and I definitely feel that I have shown this technical knowledge well in my final collection. 

Scarf #6

This scarf is currently still in the process of being made (half way!) and is still on the loom. This will be on going right until the very last second of weaving!

INSPIRATION

The inspiration from the previous warp was an image of the light reflecting from windows of one of the university buildings. I was then inspired by more windows from the Business School building on a sunny day.

It's difficult to see in these photographs whilst they are that size, but a quick zoom into the photos revealed to me the most amazing layering of shadows created by the architectural structure of the windows. This was something that I explored over the Easter holidays through drawing and collage. I would normally have created digital work using photoshop had I had access to the university computers, but alas, I do not own photoshop at home. The fact that I was forced to physically draw led me to create tactile work that has actually proven to be more helpful than I usually find photoshop work. 

DEVELOPMENT

Although the colours for these drawings aren't spot on, the idea of the sheer layers is communicated well throughout this small collection of visual references. I enjoyed using the bold geometric shapes that I have shied away from in the past. 

(Drawings exploring the layering up of thin transparent layers)

Using photoshop I took one of my drawings and one of my photographs to try and help with the design process for my warp. 

I cant express how much I love the above repeat pattern of my painting. It is only a very basic colour palette but I love the bold geometric shapes that have been created and the fact that there are so many different layers creating many different variations of the one colour. If the Jaquqard loom hadn't been fully booked up, I would have used this design to create a digitally designed sample. However I do not see this as a viable option for a scarf, as I cannot control the warp on the Jaquqard and I would not have been able to create a piece as large as I would have wanted to. 

Below is a section of one of my photos repeated in photoshop:

This became my final design for the warp:

I used a silk for the majority of the cloth as this best translated the qualities of the glass windows in my photographs. 

I was very lucky in that I managed to dye up the exact same colours for my warp! However after weaving a couple of samples I realised that I had not considered how fine the 2/120 silk was, meaning that even on plain weave, the cloth was extremely weft faced, and very fine. The fabric felt lovely and luxurious, but the dip dyed pale blue was difficult to see when I put another colour through the weft. 

(basic visualisation of how the scarf may look once finished)

I took another chance and remade the warp, setting me back a couple of days, and this is why the scarf is not finished yet! I am on track to finish on Friday afternoon with about a third of the scarf left to weave. 

This scarf is definitely a womenswear accessory. 

Scarf #5

This scarf is my favourite from the collection, even though I haven't dip dyed a single section of it! 

INSPIRATION

The main inspiration for this piece came from these two photographs. The dancing light reflected from the windows of one of the University buildings was intriguing to me. I upped the volume on the colours of the photographs and came up with a very bold brown, gold, grey, and undyed wool stripe warp design. 

Using a striped warp is very unlike my usual style of working, but I wanted to take a bit of a risk and try something different to add a bit of diversity to my work. 

Development

Above is an image of an earlier warp design from a different photograph that I adapted my colour palette to. Below is one of the first sample designs I created using Photoshop. The squares in the drawing reminded me of the brocade technique, so I took a leap of faith and tried this using a wool base cloth with silk accents and silk brocade. 

I managed to perfectly calculate the weights of the wool and silk together, neither feels too light or heavy compared to the other and both sit very well side by side. The brocade is beautiful as an accent of colour in contrast to the wool cloth. There are elements of reflection and shine expressed using the brocade, especially in the gorgeous golden colour that I managed to dye. Needless to say I am very VERY happy with this piece. 

The traditional looking check-like design of this scarf reminded me of traditional school scarf designs. The idea of using scarf design as an identity like the way schools used to was quite interesting to me and resonated with ideas I had at the very start of the year, the beginning of the Practice Unit. An example of a current traditional looking check scarf is this one by Fred Perry from A/W 13:

In terms of potential client for this piece I definitely see it as a Menswear Accessory, however I feel there could be a unisex quality with the luxurious silk brocade. The context for this Fred Perry scarf is not where I see my own work progressing towards as this is a mass produced item created in factory conditions. I am including it in my blog purely for aesthetics and target audience. The males that would be purchasing a scarf like this are the type of customer I would believe would be attracted to my product.

I have begun to realise that I firstly design the scarf, and later decide who would be the target client/buyer as I am open to designing both for Men and Women.

Scarf #4

Using a couple of my initial photographs I developed this warp design, concentrating on bold stripes of dark grey along side blue to red dip dyed stripes, all of equal width.

INSPIRATION

 As you can see on the image below, I originally planned to dip dye the light blue wool with a coral/peach/pink colour:  

(poor quality image is due to lost memory stick - disaster - and having to scan in my work that has already been printed off)

I misjudged the calculations in the dye lab which resulted in such a garish red colour that I would never normally go for. Despite this I think that the colours work well together, and the daring red (albeit out of my comfort zone) is a great contrast to the dark grey stripes.

 In an ongoing attempt to perfect the scarf making process I tried out a new technique: the leno end. This was a disasterous mistake causing hours of painful mending of ends and even resulted in a slight (very) teary meltdown in the weave room. The leno end is created using a yarn which is stronger than the base cloth yarn and acts as a barrier to the edge of the woven fabric to prevent fraying/displaced ends after removing from the loom, aiding to create a lovely fringed edge for my scarf. The leno end caused so much havoc with this warp that in the end, I decided to chop it out because my usual fast pace weaving had become a living nightmare. 

Other than "Leno Gate" I am pleased with the way that this snood has turned out. The combination of Satin and Sateen weave structures across the fabric have achieved an alternative check-like look. 

As mentioned previously this is a snood - not a scarf. Throughout the weaving process the issue of time was ever pressing, culminating in not weaving a very long length. Having a snood included in my collection is great because they are a very current style across the high street stores. I see the snood as a unisex piece. 

DEVELOPMENT

The drawing above helped to inform weave structures used. Each stripe of colour was split down the middle and threaded on separate blocks to allow me to create large chevrons with two twill structures. I made the decision to split over two blocks rather than to thread up on a pointed draft because I was eager to create larger, bolder chevrons that I did not believe could be achieved over a large pointed draft. 

Scarf #2 and #3

I was given the opportunity to stay on the looms between the last hand in and before out next allocated time on the looms. This warp was created using quick decision making. Although I liked the fact that my previous scarf was very much female, I wanted to challenge myself into creating a warp that could be aimed towards both male and female targets by using a different colour and weave structures. I doubled up the ends per inch from 16 to 32, giving the scarves a much denser, heavy duty, winter feel. I could see myself wearing both of these scarves!

Dashing Tweeds

Through some research I came to the conclusion that blond, simple shapes and weave structures lend themselves to menswear. Although Dashing tweeds fabric swatches are mainly used for suiting, the menswear designs are a great way for me to delve deeper into the area. My warp was threaded over two blocks, I used a twill weave structure for the mens scarf, and reversed it on the opposite block giving me very large chevrons. This was something that I had devloped earlier on in the practice unit, many of the weave structures I had used were a variation of the twill.


INSPIRATION

As a starting point I was looking at the way that colours are changed over time in the sky. These were two of my favourite photographs from my collection, and I quite literally took the navy and the grey out of each photograph for the menswear design. The beetroot stripes through the warp were used as a grid like structure to break up the dark dull palette. I wanted to completely contrast this with a bright and bold colour for the womenswear scarf so recreated the beetroot colour from the stripes in the warp in the dye lap to dip dye the second half of the warp. To make the betroot coloured scarf more feminine I used four different weave structures over the two blocks, creating a patchwork like pattern across the scarf and repeated this all along.

(Koen Lybaert)

(Melissa Ryder)

I am very happy with the colours of the two scarves, they compliment each other, and although the two scarves are from the same warp they create different dramas due to the colours used. The simplicity of the scarves make them easy to wear, and although I designed one for men and the other for women, they could both move between the gender boarders into the other, depending on the client.

Scarf #1

I was fortunate at the end of the Practice Unit to still be passionate about my ongoing theme, so decided to continue along the same path rather than start fresh. I had been creating samples with the view that they would develop into a product (scarf) and so I buckled down and finished this scarf. 

 INSPIRATION

My ongoing theme being "colour blends" I was mainly inspired by the drama and constant change in colour of the sky from day to night. I have always been inspired by abstract painters, and this reflects in the painterly qualities found in the different dip dyed sections of the warp. Mark Rothko is able to create a mood using simple shapes and dramatic use of colour, this was something that I wanted to translate into my weaving. 

Mark Rothko:

DEVELOPMENT

I designed this scarf for a feminine target, and would say it would most likely appeal to an older woman than myself. This would definitely be a one off piece as the dip dyed warp could not be replicated exactly, as well as the wool and silk combination feeling very luxurious, pushing the piece into a higher price bracket. 

CONTEXT

Araminta Campbell is a handweaver who produces one off handwoven luxurious scarves and shawls. These are woven on one of her two looms in her own studio, and you are able to purchase the products by getting in touch with her through an email address on her website. This seems to be something that I could do as part of a diverse career path. 

Conclusion

Looking back on this project, the earlier stages were difficult for me to pin down where I would like to see my work and what techniques I would actually use. The unit has allowed me to explore various new techniques such as double cloth and dyeing. I have given myself the license to try as many new ways of working as I could, and truly experiment and expand my knowledge of weaving techniques.

I am extremely happy with how the project has worked out, I have finally decided on where I see my work progressing towards, and have discovered that I love to dip dye my warp, something that I was wary of doing before.

My last two warps have given my work the anchoring to scarf making that I desired at the start of the unit.
I do feel that it has been a long and ever changing journey to get to where I am with my work today.