Final Evaluation

Overall i think i am really happy with how my garment turned out. This is because i feel it portrays my themes well even though one is a lot more subtle than the other. It is quite clear that one of my themes is the human form, or the change of it more importantly, but the theme of maps isn't as clear. The influence that it had on the garment was mainly for the shaping. I looked at the lines on the map and found certain shapes that influenced my initial designs. The collar was designed using this technique, but the main body of the coat was made to fit the second theme. It does this by hiding all of the natural human form and creating a new shape for the body.

The part that i am most proud of is the back because i found it more challenging than any other part of the coat. i have never attempted a complex pattern like that one and was surprised at hoe neat and accurate it turned out at the end. The only problem that i have with the back is the gathered neck line that occurred when i attached the collar by hand.

From looking at the beginning of the project and then again at the end, you can see that there has been quite a change in the themes and also my designs. Looking back, the first designs that i did were a lot more commercial looking, but as the project progressed, i feel that my designs have improved and look more high fashion.

I'm really happy with how well the fabric that i chose to work with turned out. i was slightly worried that the fabric wasn't thick enough, but from feeling the weight of the coat, i can now see that if the material was any thicker the coat would be impractical because of how heavy it would be. Luckily the coat is more of a contemporary piece and isn't "ready to wear" because of its other impractical attributes, like the collar for instance. It restricts the head movements because of the size of it. Saying that i think the use of foam tubes was a really good idea as they retained their shape as well as being extremely flexible.

I am surprised at how much i liked the end product of this project and actually really proud of the work i have produced over that last 8 weeks, especially because of the amount of work and effort i put in. The only thing that i regret is that i didn't produce as much work at the beginning of the project as i did towards the end, and maybe if i had done slightly more research it may have made my garment even stronger.

Planned Photo Shoot

To finish off the project I want to do a mini photo shoot, keeping it really simple and basic, making sure that the focus is on the garment. 

If time allowed and I had the resources, I would have liked to do a much bigger shoot that tells a story, but unfortunately I am unable to do this. Instead, I am going to plan the shoot in my book to show what I would have created. 

The story behind the potential photo shoot is a science lab experiment, an experiment to try and enhance the human form that then went wrong. The protruding spine featured in my coat would be a side effect from this. I envisioned the model to be extremely skinny not for the usual reasons why many fashion houses choose these types of models, but because it gives off the effect of mistreatment and malnourishment that may actually occur if illegal experiments were taking place. 

This image is actually from the popular TV series breaking bad, which depicts a Lab, intended to make crystal meth. I quite like the dirtiness of it, and I think could work really well alongside the theme. The only negative that I can think of is where my piece is very dark in colour, I think it might blend in to the background to much, by using a white (modern) Lab it might do the opposite, but maybe this isn't a good thing. 

I also thought about incorporating something that has seemed to occur quite a lot when asking people for feedback on my piece. Just from looking at the final garment many of my peers have commented saying that it looks like the skeleton of a dinosaur, and in all honesty and can really see where they are coming from. 

I think the use of an albino model for this photo shoot would look amazing. When people think of experiments, we visualise white rats with pink eyes being tested on, so using models such as Shaun Ross and Diandra Forrest the audience pick up on the convention and gather what the story is trying to tell them a lot faster.

Construction of the garment

Overall I found the actual making of the coat quite simple because I have constructed various different garments before. Even though I have made patterns previously I have never attempted such a complex pattern. The reason why I decided to create this pattern was because I wanted to make my garment more 3D and interesting to look at. The only other way that I considered creating the effect of a spine was to make it out of knit. By using the technique called bubbles it would form 3D shapes down the back similar to the way they do it in Pattern Magic, but I decided against it because I didn't think that knit would work as well as a stiffer fabric because of the oversized shape I'm going for. I decided to make the coat long so that it covers up as much of the actual human form as much as possible. 


The part that I found the most difficult to construct was the collar. It took me a while to get my head around how to create the tubing around the neck and I came to the conclusion that I was going to use foam tubes usually used for instillation and wrap them in fabric. I found the hand stitching them on to the garment extremely time consuming and if I was to do it again I would find a way of redoing this process so it was quicker and also neater.




I was surprised at the fact that I managed to construct the coat in 3 days and also how finished it looked at the end. If time allowed I would have liked to include a lining into my garment to neaten up the inside of the coat but I am still happy with how it looks from the outside. 

Developing my design on the mannequin

Before I created my pattern I decided to place the squares on the mannequin first to see what it would look like and was really surprised at how effective it looked. Even though it was only made out of paper, I could already see what it was meant to be and could visualise what it would look like on a garment. One thing that I wish I had done was make the squares smaller as I went down, so that it looked slightly more like a spine, but after thinking more about it I have realized that the smaller the boxes would have got, the harder it would have been to keep the shape and stop it from looking like a lump protruding from the fabric.  

Even though i practiced my pattern on a much smaller scale at home, i found it difficult to enlarge it onto a pattern and work out where to cut and how to keep the boxes attached because they were also enlarged. after working out how to do this it all became quite simple, i realised shortly after creating it that i would only have to use the top half of the pattern and repeat the process over and over again until i achieved the length i wanted. 

I actually enjoyed the pattern making process so much that i might consider furthering this and could possibly go into a career that incorporates this. If i hadn't had chosen such a complex pattern to create then i don't think i would have considered it because i really enjoyed the challenge. 

Final Designing

After completing my accessory, it was time to figure out what garment I want to create. Out of my two themes the one I seem to have focused on the most is change of the human form. The way I have incorporated this into my designs is by making the garments extremely oversized to hide what the body actually looks like underneath. 

In the book pattern magic, the section on lumps and bumps really goes well with my theme as I could use them to create something that resembles a spine down the back. To do this the fabric that I use is going to have to be rather stiff and heavy, so I have chosen dark blue British wool that is usually used for coats. 

In my final design I drew a collar that looks as if it’s piped. Originally I planned to digital print onto this part but time hasn't allowed me to do this, so I am going to make it out of the same fabric that the rest of the coat will be made in. Getting my head round the actual construction of the collar took a while as I was debating what to use as the piping. I needed something wide, bendy and long but also didn't weigh too much. I started by trying to use things like bubble wrap and bubble packaging that I rolled up to get the width that I wanted, but then realised this would be very impractical because when it came to sewing it to the rest of the garment it would just pop. So I have decided to use long foam tubes, which hopefully will work a lot better. 

Fashion Photo Shoot

Once I had completed my accessory, (which took the form of a body crown, made from polystyrene chips creating multiple spinal cords), I documented my work by way of a photo shoot. The concept that I came up with was related to my theme of changing the human form. My body adornment piece is an extension of the bone structure, so for the shoot I wanted to play on the opposite of that and find something that reflected stereotypical ideas of body image. That’s when I came up with ballet. Ballet is all about perfection, and body image is an important part of that. Some women actually take it so far that they starve themselves so that their bones start to protrude on their back and chest. 

After looking through magazines, I found adverts from Balenciaga and Chanel that used reflections to enhance their image, which I thought related really well to my project because it could make my photograph look as if it was located in a dance studio. 

It was quite important to me to use a black model when choosing whom I wanted to cast for the shoot, to highlight the lack of diversity within professional ballet. Even though in the past few years, companies such as the Royal Ballet have tried to show that they do include other ethnicities in their casting, they tend to be Asian as opposed to people with an African origin. This is largely to do with the build of their bodies. Stereotypical ballerinas have almost no curves when it comes to the bust and bum areas, and many black/African women don't fit this description. 

I tried to keep the colours matching to my scheme that runs through my sketchbook so that it looks as if it flows nicely. 

This wasn't the outcome that I actually envisioned at the beginning of the week. I wanted a naturally dark background with spotlighting on the model, but in the space that I used I found this to be extremely difficult so I tried to develop the pictures on Photoshop using some of the techniques I learnt during the digital print week. 

The thing that I was happiest about was how my actual accessory piece turned out, but unfortunately I think that the angle of the model closest to the front of the photo highlights how thin and flimsy the piece is. The thing that surprised me the most from my outcome was how much I actually liked the layered effect of the two different images. I think it actually makes the model look really empowered which is something that I wanted to make sure I got across. I think if I have the time, I would like to reshoot as I don't think I am entirely happy with the original images that I started off with, but unfortunately I was running out of time and took the decision to work with the material that I had.