As I mentioned before I’ve been really keen to start developing the samples I’ve been working on into more substantial garments.
First and foremost, I always always think about the technique and appeal of the fabric I’m designing before I consider it in the context of an actual piece of clothing, and for this reason I mainly think of myself as a Textile designer rather than a Fashion girl. That being said, I think it’s really important that I show that I can visualise my work successfully and can see my designs as they’re intended to be worn. Producing actual wearable pieces gets me more excited about what I’m doing too, so with that in mind I’ve had a wee idea to experiment with a few simple little bodycon skirts. Their shape means that I should be able to produce them without the aid of the linker etc, and their straight and simple lines should keep the emphasis on my heavily techniqued based designs.
Just a few things in the online world I’ve been loving over the past couple of weeks…
Knitkicks - www.knitkicks.co.uk
I stumbled across this lovely wee site a bit randomly and ended up staying a while (sometimes I feel like I could spend weeks wandering in the world of online blogging… there is so much talent out there!) Run by Jen Jarvis, knit kicks is dedicated to catwalk and graduate knitting talent, a refreshing change from most of the other knitting based blogs I’ve come across which tend to be either a bit stuffy or centred on personal knitting projects. I especially love graduate Hannah Buswells work with her bright fairisle stripes and panels. Like me she’s not afraid of colour and everyone knows I love a pattern…
Over the last wee while I’ve been trying to play around with different garment ideas. Those who are clued up on knitty related matters will know that working with knitwear raises all kinds of little bothers to overcome when it comes to constructing even very simple shaped garments.. Obviously, you can’t just knit a huge square of fabric and pattern cut into it as the continuous thread of the fabric would just unravel - disaster!
At Art School I always had access to a linker, a very clever machine that sort of catches the stitches from the different panels of fabric and stitches them neatly together.. perfect! If you look at any edge on the inside of a cardigan or the like you will see the lovely little neat edge it leaves behind.
Just wanted to write a quick little post to mention the one and only Mr Fox, yarn supplier extraordinaire, and my personal saviour when it comes to all things knit related!
Bury based Mr fox owns Fairfield Yarns, an absolute Alladins cave of every kind of yarn you could be looking for, with a somewhat bizarre theme of vintage railway memorabilia dotted around alongside…!
I thought I’d write a little post on the process I tend to go through when designing the things I make and all the things I’m trying to keep doing to keep inspiration up and keep pushing myself!
My course always put a huge emphasis on drawing, and this is something I’ve tried to keep up since finishing. I’m obsessed with geometric patterns and structures and my past inspiration has come from a huge variety of sources from fishing ports, old tiles, facades and shutters in little details of buildings.
I Studied Textile Design at the Glasgow School of Art, specialising in knitwear after my first year. While some Textiles and Fashion Design students pass there designs onto manufacturers to produce, GSA placed alot of emphasis on us being highly trained at the manual production aspect of out specialisms as well as the design process. Initially we were trained to machine knit on domestic Brother machines; the chunkier effect they produce means you can see the stitches really clearly and get a good grasp of all the different techniques. I was always desperate to get onto the more fiddly intricate stuff, but starting out like this really helped me learn the basic principles of how to manipulate stitches and achieve effects that could be applied when we moved onto using the lovely fine industrial machines later on.
A couple of photos of very early work…!