Dissertation Preperation

Our lecture today was aimed at preparing us for our 3rd year dissertation. Interestingly, the advice we were given in the lecture from Dr Jeremy Spencer (delivered to the yr 2 art students as a whole), differed somewhat from the advice given in our seminar (delivered to our yr 2 fashion and textiles class afterwards).

Dr Spencer was keen to advise that our dissertation is meant to be an argument and that we need to write with a purpose, and that the title should always pose a problem that your dissertation should solve. There was also some really good tips about dissertation structure.

In our seminar Jackie gave us some good tips too. The difference between an essay and a dissertation,  where to get ideas for deciding on what your dissertation will be based on, and how to make a start.

She was keen to emphasis that we should write about something that we love and are passionate about, and that it doesn't necessarily have to pose a problem.

I know that the 3rd year will be really hard work next year, and I will struggle to balance my uni work with my family life. So I MUST use this summer - not just for internships and work experience, and giving my house a much needed sort out - but write the 1st draft of my dissertation, collate a decent sketchbook of work for my pre-collection and have done a few experimental toiles. This way, I can start the new term on a role.

I have a few ideas mingling around in my head about what my dissertation might be about, but nothing firm in mind. It will very likely be about historical clothing, and I am more interested in working class women and the making of textiles and clothes. For example, I often pick up hand made vintage aprons and pinnys at car boot sales, and they all sit in a suitcase under my bed. When I look at them, I wonder about the woman who made and wore it, there is something evocative about them to me. This might be a good social and cultural thing to look into and I could probably look at it from a feminist angle too.

Woman's Hour Fashion Special

Celia Birtwell; Grayson and Philippa Perry; Breton stripes

Jenni Murray talks to Celia Birtwell about her passion for print, textiles and her career in fashion.

We discuss the difference between clothes and fashion; why is it that we form an emotional attachment to some clothes and throw others out?

Grayson and Philippa Perry talk about the wardrobe they share with Clare, Grayson's alter ego.

Fashion historian Amber Butchart and Melanie Rickey examine the enduring appeal of the Breton Stripe.

And we ask why do so many of us adopt a kind of uniform, wearing the same colours and styles, day in and day out?

Personal Philosophy Presentation

Today I gave my presentation on my personal philosophy. The presentation features designers that I think my work relates to and why, and discusses the subjects around fashion that are beginning to shape my personal philosophy.

Former model, Ulyana Sergeenko has turned from being an avid Moscow-based buyer of haute couture, into a couturier herself. She uses local Russian artisans to adorn her glamorous gowns with traditional details and techniques. At a preview a couple of days before her latest show, Sergeenko was keen to point out the hand-painted beaded fringe suspended from the back of a silk gown, or how the wool appliqué blue cornflowers employ a special technique normally used for carpet making. I really like how her collections are often inspired by traditional and historical dress too for example her latest collection was a reimagining of a ride on the Orient Express, crossing the borders of the former Soviet republics of Kazakhstan, Turkmenistan, and Uzbekistan.

Orsola de Castro started and her sustainable fashion label, From Somewhere in 1998, upcycling 2nd hand clothes made from luxury fabrics. She has now become more of an environmentalist within the fashion industry. “I’m always asked by journalists what are my tips for shopping ethically. Find a young designer whether they call themselves sustainable or not.  You are encouraging local production, pieces made with quality and creativity.  Young designers work in such a way, buy whatever you can but because you’re not willing to compromise.  You use your creativity.  Very often, the collections are produced locally using scraps – that’s a need rather than a commitment.

When I visited the Paul Smith exhibition at the Design Museum at the end of last year I was really interested to learn how Paul works in a similar way to myself.

Although I already admired his designs for their wearability with a sense of fun, it was exciting to learn about the man himself, and his office full of quirky objects, that can spark off an idea for his next collection. What Paul Smith does well, is to take historic and traditional inspirations as a reference, but develop them into something contemporary, unexpected and quirky.

I always draw inspiration from historical designs and traditional clothing from other cultures, I am an avid collector of beautiful things, and in truth a bit of a hoarder, but like Paul smith the things around me help me in my design process.

What I need to work on, is how I can successfully develop my historically inspired designs, to make them more contemporary, in a similar way to Smith.

My collecting habit also feeds my love of craft, it often introduces me to skilled textile techniques, and I often marvel at the time and skill involved in creating such beautiful pieces. From these pieces I can try and incorporate or reimagine the techniques in my own designs, in a similar way to Ulyana Sergeenko.

I am often given unwanted antique or vintage textiles from family members, or can be seen rummaging around in house clearance boxes at car boot sales, where I rehome unloved and unappreciated clothing, pieces of fabric, hand-made lace or embroidery. Often people today fail to value the old, which to me - often means high quality and well made, with love.

As you can probably tell, I hate throwing anything away and this is one of the reasons why I am keen to include the ethics of sustainability in my my design. Like Orsola de Castro, I can use my collection of 2nd hand textiles to make my final collection, to make beautifully crafted one off pieces, but it is also to important for me to explore how to make use of waste textiles on an larger scale, so I can produce larger runs of designs, if need be.

Giving my presentation went better than expected. I didn't use notes, and I kept within the time allowance. Of course there where lots of little bits that I missed out and forgot to mention. Next time, to help jog my memory, I might write down a list of technical and descriptive words that could help give a more professional tone to my presentation.

Wow by Holly McNish

Deborah Coughlin and 'Plus sized' fashion on Woman's Hour

You can listen here to Deborah Coughlin and read her article for the Feminist Times online Sadomasochism on the High Street here.

Lee Lapthorne Lecture

Lee Lapthorne was our guest speaker today. I first met Lee in Yr 0 of this course, when he tutored us for two studio modules.  So it was really interesting to learn in more depth about his career and the invaluable advise he had to pass on.

Lee Lapthorne's Print Designs

Lee has an MA with distinction in Textiles, has his own range of high-end scarves and bow ties, and has produced hundreds of catwalk shows for Britain's biggest design talent including Zandra Rhodes,  Jasper Conran, Peter Pillotto and Gareth Pugh with his company Doll. He has also launched an independent international platform that bridges the gap between on and off schedule designers: On|Off


Some of the key advice that Lee gave us was:

• Focus on what you, as a designer, are good at - it is good to have a knowledge of all things, but you must be a master of one.  He gave us some examples of designers that have built their name up slowly, but had staying power, as they did one particular garment especially well. Christopher Raeburn is known for his parka jackets, Palmer Harding for their cotton shirts.
• Costing and target customer - If you are going to make a scarf that will have to retail at £400+ to cover the cost of materials and labour, you need to consider what sort of customer will be able to afford to spend that much, and then market your product towards them.
• Branding & Marketing - Lee sited the young british design J W Anderson's website as a good example of branding for his target audience.
• The importance of persistence and serendipity - Lee spent a long time ringing and emailing large companies, and sending the examples and images of his designs. But because he also wore his designs to meetings, often industry key figures noticed them and asked them where he got them from. He was finally motivated to launch his scarf collection when a Selfridge's member of staff asked where they could by his scarves.

Lee's lecture has really made me consider what sort of person I want to be designing for, how I can brand my 'label' and the importance of wearing my own work. This will really help me when considering the direction I will take in my 3rd Year.

The Voice of fashion & Textiles

It is often implied that fashion is a conspiracy to distract women from more important issues such as politics and society, therefore confining females to a more inferior social order than males. This suggests that fashion is frivolous and unimportant. What this opinion fails to recognise, is the the important role that fashion has to play in social an cultural order.

I while back I watched an interesting programme on channel 4 with Greyson Perry called In the Best Possible Taste . It explored the 'taste' of the different social classes in Britain and how they dressed and decorated their homes 'spoke' and betrayed their social status. Similarly, I found the book Watching the English by, anthropologist, Kate Fox very interesting. It explores the behaviour of the English and identifies the 'tell signs' of social class not only through behaviour and language, but through what a person chooses to buy or wear or drive.

What we wear says so much about us before we even open our mouths to speak our views or believes, quiet often someone has already formed an opinion of us. For this reason fashion has often led cultural change. From the 1920s 'flapper' to 1990s 'rapper'. Sub-cultural groups have often made a point of moving away from mainstream fashion and trying to dress differently- to identify themselves as different from the mainstream society, only for their style to be copied by followers, and then, ironically, by the mainstream fashion.

We also dress for different occasions, it is widely accepted in the UK that you would wear a suit to an interview, particularly if you are a man, or something smart if you are a woman. If you are attending a funeral, it is usual to wear black, and if you were attending a wedding as a guest, it would be a faux-pas to wear white. However, these codes of fashion are different depending on what country or culture you are from. In india, a bride would wear red traditionally, and white is the colour for mourning.

Fashion is not only important socially, but politically too. Josiah Wedgewood designed an anti-slavery medallion that could be worn as a pendant or ring, or set into a snuff box.  "At length the taste for wearing them became general, and thus fashion…was seen for once in the honourable office of promoting the cause of justice and, humanity and freedom" Thomas Clarkson, founder of the Committee for the Abolition of the Slave Trade. Wedgewood had exploited fashion as vehicle for political change.

The turbulent century: Social cultural and political change 1920-1990

1900-10: 

Education Welfare, Suffragettes formed in 1903, social status, liberal party, labour party formed, Selfridges founded in 1909, Charles Frederick Worth, Paul Poiret, Bloomsbury Group founded in 1910.

1910-20: 

Titanic 1912,women’s role in society in terms of work and vote, Coco Chanel, clothes became more practical, WW1, Land girls army, Cars and Planes, 1910 sewing machine invented.

1920-30: 

Jazz music, alcohol, cigarettes, Art Deco, Dada, Surrealism, Women given the vote, Flapper girls, women working, 

1930-40: 

First Televisions in homes, Wall street crash, Holiday camps, WW2, Women working in mens roles.

1940-50:

WW2 ends, NHS, Rock and Roll, Austerity Olympic games in Britain.

1950-60: 

Festival of Britain, Queen Elizabeth II, The Cold War, Beatniks, 

1960-70: 

The Beatles, England wins World Cup, Mini-Skirt, Swinging London.

1970-80: 

3-day working week, Vietnam, Thatcher, Andy Warhol, Flares, Free-love, Missoni

1980-90: 

Gay rights, Fall of Berlin Wall, Falklands, Live Aid, Power suits, Club culture

1990-2000: 

Death of Princess Diana, Spice Girls, Designer Logos, Internet, Mobile phones for the masses.

Fashion & Feminism

2013 seemed to be the year of new feminism, so called The fourth wave, with  Laura Bates, 27, and Her Everyday Sexism Project,  Caroline Criado-Perez, 29, leading the campaign for women to feature on bank notes,  the No more page 3 petition, and students began banning summer hit 'Blurred Lines' on many UK campuses - to name just a few campaigns.

Up until 2012, I didn't really think all that much about feminism, but reading Caitlin Moran's 'How to be a Woman' change that.


“These days, however, I am much calmer - since I realised that it’s technically impossible for a woman to argue against feminism. Without feminism, you wouldn’t be allowed to have a debate on women’s place in society. You’d be too busy giving birth on the kitchen floor - biting down on a wooden spoon, so as not to disturb the men’s card game - before going back to quick-liming the dunny. This is why those female columnists in the Daily Mail - giving daily wail against feminism - amuse me. They paid you £1,600 for that, dear, I think. And I bet it’s going in your bank account, and not your husband’s. The more women argue loudly, against feminism, the more they both prove it exists and that they enjoy its hard-won privileges.” 
― Caitlin Moran, How to Be a Woman


The Telegraph article, Is Fashion a feminist issue, after all?, discusses that with feminism getting a new 'makeover' this year, is it time that we stopped excusing the fashion industry for glamourising the portrayal of exploitation women and girls?

"So here we are, in an artificially sweaty swamp where S&M is viewed as fashion styling, and "porn-chic" has seeped so far into mainstream culture that tiny girls wear high heels and halter necks and hoards of teenagers go out in clothes that used to be the preserve of prostitutes. It's fashion, isn't it? Ergo, it can't be pornographic.

The really whacked-out aspect of all this is that often the women promoting these images - the editors, the model and photographer agents, the show producers - dress like nuns."

- Lisa Armstrong, Is Fashion a feminist issue, after all?

As the mother of a 10 year-old girl, I am acutely aware of the negative portrayal of women across the media spectrum: 

music videos, celeb mags, fashion adverts/shoots, newspapers, the rise of free internet porn, it's starting to get really scary, It's like we have regressed a half century. Is there any wonder that some young men have such little respect for women, and some young women have little more respect for themselves?  Long live the fourth wave as far as I'm concerned, lets make feminism the new fashion.

Fashion & Psychoanalysis

Another difficult subject tackled in this weeks lecture was psychoanalysis in relation to visual culture. A therapy invented by Sigmund Freud, who believed that people could be cured of their anxiety and depression by revealing their unconscious thoughts, which are suppressed within our dreams and fantasies, and blocked by a natural defence mechanism of the brain.

An even more complicated sub category of this theory is the Oedipus Complex, a highly controversial theory which analyses the sexual desire that a boy might have for his mother read here for a better explanation than I can give!

It also suggests that although men are attracted to women, they also feel threatened by women. This is why the portrayal of women in the media tends to lean towards the idea of women as objects of desire for the male gaze.

Fashion advertisements often use the female form in a submissive way, the woman is attractive, but not threatening as discussed in this article featuring D&G's controversial 2007 ad-campaign.

Craft in Fashion

“Craft has never been more important than now, as an antidote to mass production and as a practice in which the very time it takes to produce an object becomes part of its value in a world that often moves too fast.”

Caroline Roux, Acting editor, Crafts magazine

When I visited the Valentino exhibition last year my favourite part of the exhibition was downstairs, where you could look in detail at samples of the different construction techniques used to create certain elements of Valentino's dresses. The workers in the atelier sew everything by hand, spending hundreds of hours on a single piece. So many hours, so many women and they never use a sewing machine, they hand sew everything. Apparently the women were bought  a sewing machine once and it sat in a corner, unused!

Fashion is often seen as frivolous, and with the fast and cheap fashion that is on offer to consumers today, it is easy to forget the huge amount of work that often goes into the couture collections  that march down the runways at the fashion weeks.

The article 'Craft Works' in Vogue, Oct '13, highlights the astonishing amount of work that goes in to producing individual detailing on the garments designed by the likes of Vuitton, Bottega Veneta and Erdem.

Vuitton F/W '13-'14- feathers trimmed with 

scissors and hand-sewn onto tulle 

image via www.vogue.it

Botegga Veneta F/W '13-'14 - Silk and wool 

bonded onto day dress to create watercolour-like patterns

image via www.style.com

Erdem F/W '13-'14 - Window pane tweed woven with neon PVC 

and ostrich feathers attached to thread narrow enough to go

 through a loom.

image via www.style.com

I am 'guilty' myself of buying cheap fashion, and I believe there is a place for it, as I think that fashion should be accessible for all walks, not just the elite. However, I do place great importance on craft in fashion - luxurious fabrics and beautiful artisanal details elevate a garment into the realms of a piece of art, not just to treasure but to showcase on oneself.

Sustainability in Fashion

I few years ago I read and article about the ethical fashion designer Orsola de Castro. I can't remember where it was, but I do remember how interesting and inspiring it was.

A few years back speedo designed a super-duper, hi-tech, professional swim suit, but it wasn't long before athletes where banned from wearing it in competitions, as it was deemed to give the wearer an unfair advantage. So Speedo had a massive problem, what where they to do with all these swimsuits they had manufactured, but had become unsaleable? Landfill?

This is where Orsola de Castro stepped in. Castro started her London based fashion label, From Somewhere, in 1997. Initially she breathed new life into second-hand clothes that would have been destined for landfill. For example, creating something beautiful and unique from a moth-eaten cashmere cardi, by hand crocheting around the holes. But in 2001, on a visit to a knitwear factory in Italy (that manufactures for designers such as Yves St Laurent and Karl Lagerfeld) she realised that with the huge amount off offcuts on the floor, she could make a whole collection from scratch, not just the one-offs she had been making previously.

Speedo gave 5,000 of these obsolete swimsuits to Castro and she set about creating them into a 10-peice collection of cocktail dresses. The collection was launched at london fashion week and Selfridges, Luxe.com promptly placed an order for S/S '11.

I think it is a very slow process, but I do do believe that the fashion industry is becoming more conscious of sustainability and ethical manufacturing, with big companies such as H&M, M&S and Tesco working towards improving ethics. Personally, I do shop at Primark on occasion, but I also believe very strongly that it is important for us to try and change the way the industry thinks. It's not about all designers recycling and upcycling, but it is their duty to find a use for their waste textiles, or to give it to someone who will find a use for it, it shouldn't just go up in smoke.



Sources & further reading:

http://fashion.telegraph.co.uk/article/TMG7986905/Prince-of-Waless-Start-initiative-rubbish-designs.html

http://www.designweek.co.uk/analysis/when-design-in-sport-goes-too-far/3034422.article

http://fashion.telegraph.co.uk/article/TMG8254833/Sri-Lankan-upcycling-factory-makes-waves-in-the-fashion-industry.html

http://fashion.telegraph.co.uk/news-features/TMG7205477/Orsola-de-Castro-The-ethical-fashion-designer.html

http://www.ecouterre.com/fashion-world-changer-orsola-de-castro-speaks-out-on-textile-waste/

http://www.theguardian.com/environment/2013/oct/06/ethical-high-street-clothes-supply-chain-bangladesh

Semiology

The first lecture of the year 2 has raised it's ugly head and as set the tone for the year ahead - complicated! It was quite a lot to deal with on the first day back, and quite a lot of it went over my head, but I think the main things that I came out of with was this:

Semiotics is the study of signs, A sign is a recognisable combination of a signifier with a particular signified.  

•  signified: the concept a tree
•  signifier: the sound or spoken word 'tree'

• All things have a symbolic meaning - things or images are the signs.
• Culture is the giving and taking of meaning between people - people create meanings.
• Words change between languages and cultures, but concepts remain the same.
• The meaning of a word is dependent on the word being in a system. e.g. traffic lights: Red means stop in a set of traffic lights, but only because it is in a system next to amber and green - it only means stop when in this system. Out of this system the meaning disappears.

Following the lecture, we were able to put this theory into practise in relation to fashion. In groups we had to deconstruct the a fashion magazine advert featuring a white shirt, each group had a different ad, and the task was to identify what connotations the advert was trying to project to the reader about the shirt/brand through both subtle or overt signs used in the advert, including: written text, pose of model, surroundings. It was surprising how different the connotations were, for the same item of clothing - a white shirt, a classic wardrobe staple.