Final Design

I have now come to creating my final piece for my sweets project. Having drawn up some initial designs and put some more thought into what I would like to create, I have come up with this as my final design. 

I think this would be an effective final piece as it highlights everything and all the samples I have used throughout my project. The idea of a sweet shop with shelves, came from my initial inspiration from Grumpy's sweet shop in Llandudno, where I visited at the very start of my project. As well as this, I have also taken inspiration from my artists and designers, particularly in the samples I have used within the piece. 
I have included photos of my final piece below, I am very pleased with the overall outcome of this. I feel I have successfully created what I set out to do at the start of the project, in an interesting, detailed and yummy-looking final piece. 

Initial Design Ideas

So I have now moved on to the final part of my exam project, designing my final piece. I wanted to explore all my options, from a fashion piece, to a flat or 3D piece. So I used all the inspiration from my project so far to come up with these four design ideas.

I think having made a fashion piece in my last project, I would quite like to do something different. So I am leaning towards one of the two flat/3D pieces, and could perhaps come up with another idea that is a combination of the two for my final design.

Sweet Inspiration

To bring a focus to my inspiration and bring all my ideas together for designing my final piece, I decided to create a mood board. My mood board features everything I have taken inspiration from during this project so far, and so will hopefully help me decide on what to make as my final design. As I have used a lot of fashion based designs as inspiration, it would make sense for me to produce a fashion piece on a mannequin. Although I do like this idea, due to my love of fashion, I think it would be wise to explore all my other options before deciding on my final outcome.

 I feel my mood board, alongside my sample work, will definitely be useful when developing and designing my final piece for this project. 

Development of Samples

In order to get the best grade I can possibly get, development of my work is essential. Whilst experimenting with techniques, it was suggested that to improve I combine a few of my samples together, and therefore techniques, to create exciting new ones. So I kept this in mind when creating my final samples for my final piece. As well as this, I also wanted to make sure I linked my work to my designers' work, so I've added a few techniques and ideas in to ensure I do this. 

Below the photos show some development of my final samples.

Sweet, Sweet Sample Sheets

Recently I've been very busy creating my sweet inspired samples. Using the inspiration captured in my visual sheet and from the designers featured on this blog, I have experimented extensively with different techniques to create a wide range of unique samples. 
I then went on to mount my work on sheets, as I fancied a change, having done my last two projects in sketchbooks. 
Some of the techniques featured in these samples include: shibori wax, string and foam printing, felting, use of melted plastics and fibres, use of acetate, layering of materials, use of angelina fibres, stitching into photographs, trapping materials in plastic wallets and distressing various surfaces with the heat gun. Most of my samples are made from a combination of these techniques, as I like to experiment to see what works best.

My next step is to continue experimenting and developing my sample work, and then decide which samples I would like to use in my final piece.

A Sweet Treat

I've now completed the first part of my project, my visual research sheet. This is made up from all the different sketches, paintings, and mixed media pieces  I have created over the past three weeks. During this time we were really encouraged to experiment with our work and try new techniques, some which I learnt off YouTube, to try and achieve the highest grade possible. 

To create the actual visual sheet, my larger a2 and a3 pieces were cut up and patched together with some smaller sketches and some of the photos I had taken for inspiration. 

I will now use the ideas captured in my visual sheet as inspiration when experimenting with a variety of different techniques to create and develop my sample work.

London Fashion Week AW13

Looking for furthur inspiration for my textiles work, I've turned to the catwalks of London Fashion Week for AW13, where I'm hoping to find some interesting and inspiring designs.

John Rocha showed simple, yet original, textured designs that spoke volumes in terms of size and wow factor.



These are amongst my favourites from his collection, using diverse techniques to create interesting textures and volume. These bright colours link in with the colours I'm using in my project and I think it would be interesting to try and recreate some of these textures myself. The pink one in particular reminds me of fluffy candyfloss.

In contrast at Malene Oddershede Bach we saw bright vivid colours printed on chic black.

I really like the striking effect the use of the bright colours on the black background gives, and feel this could be something I could bring to my own textile design work. This could be recreated through paint splatter or by using prints in the shapes of sweets to provide a clear link to my work and create some individual and diverse designs.