Arts Thread

Final Year University portfolio. It was important to me to relate my final collection back to myself. I began to reminisce over old memories, looking back at photographs. Upon looking at these images, I realised that they evoked many memories that I had forgotten, especially relating to my childhood. After thinking about my own memory of childhood times, I was unclear whether memories I had were my own recollection or ones that had been implanted or altered in my mind, by photographs and stories relayed by older friends and relatives. The project explores the idea of forgotten nostalgia. Memories distort and become inaccurate records of the actual events over time. Looking at images of myself as a child, often wearing items of my parent’s clothing, lead to further research on children wearing clothes incorrectly. The childhood images often depicted the wearing of oversized and mismatched garments. I combined casualwear with tailoring aspects, involving sweatshirts, jackets, altered and layered garments, emphasising distortion in fashion. To capture the idea of ‘a forgotten nostalgia’, I have experimented with merging different concepts and techniques. My research highlighted mismatched concepts, which I have captured by mixing different fashion genres, including tailoring and casualwear. The final line-up features fashion items, such as sweatshirts and workman's jackets, which have been layered and edited, to achieve a collection based on distorted memories and incorrectly worn clothing. I have adapted original pattern blocks to highlight this distortion further, for example using basic sweatshirt blocks to create skirts and scarves, as 'incorrectly worn items’. I have also experimented with blocks of colour within my collection, to capture the childhood aspects of my concept, including colours traditionally considered to clash, such as red and pink. To further highlight the mismatched ideas within my collection, I have included a mix of fabric textures, such as wool jacket material, thick and thin sweatshirt jersey, neoprene, and rib.

Second Year University portfolio. The initial concept of my second-year menswear project began with the selection of the following designers, Matthew Miller, a sportswear brand, and contemporary designer, JordanLuca. After choosing these brands, I researched the design DNA, heritage, and ethos of both designers’ brands and started to brainstorm the direction I wanted to head in, with a focus on sportswear. From both brands, I wanted to take inspiration from their colour palettes, details, shape, and silhouettes, for my own take on their collaboration. I selected the key market of Asia Pacific, specifically Tokyo, and explored the culture, lifestyle, and current trends. After my research into current trends in Japan, I came across the men's contemporary fashion and streetwear brand, Poliquant, which has played a big part in the inspiration for my project. I found that this brand was a perfect combination of Matthew Miller’s and JordanLuca’s designs, with the same customer market focus. Leading on from this, I began to research climbing harnesses and how I could use these in my work, as both brands have used these within their work. During my research into mountain climbing, I came across images of the first men to the top of Mount Everest. These images particularly stood out to me due to the colour palettes of their clothing. As my research developed, I looked into the famous Andes Mountain plane crash in 1972. This had a heavy influence on my design narrative, as I followed the survivors’ tale of events and took inspiration from photographs of the crash site. I paid particular attention to the survivors’ use of layered clothing for warmth and therefore I have decided to experiment with this concept in my final collection. Their use of survival skills and making the most of what they had, will play a big part in my collection, including the use of items that would have been in the debris of the crash site, such as emergency blankets. It follows the survivor’s tale of events and features upcycled objects that would typically be found in the debris of the crash site, in order to keep the survival element of the collection alive.