Preparing to exhibit...

After researching for inspiration on how to present my garment, I felt a strong colour contract was needed. I felt because my dress is white, I needed a really dark background in order for it to stand out successfully. I managed to borrow a large black curtain that will be hung as a back drop. 

Putting up the curtain was a real challenge as it was very heavy and difficult to handle. I was assisted in this process as I struggled with it on my own. The tools that were used in this process were a staple gun, ladders and long planks of wood. The staple gun seemed to be the quickest and most secure way to attatchment the curtain to the ceiling. 

After the curtain was hung, I came across a slight issue. Along the bottom of the curtain was very loose - which made the overall appearence unprofessional. To solve this matter, I thought about putting a weight behind the curtain to hold it down flat. I used pieces of wood from the workshop and borrowed and piece of wood from construction to pin down the curtain. This seemed a much quicker way than cutting and hemming the fabric. 

Alternative idea

After sketching out dress designs that related to my concept, I thought of purchasing a second hand dress. This would be a better idea as it's mainly about the focus of my concept and not the structure of dress.  I began to phone charity shops and ask around to see if anybody was selling their wedding dress. Eventually after no success from the charity shops, I managed to find one on a Facebook selling page. 

My ideology of what you see on the outside, doesn't necessarily mean reality. My ideas of altering the dress so that it looks close to perfect on the outside and in contrast, burnt and disintigrated at the back of the dress. This again reflects back to my conceptual idea that when you see a couple in a relationship in public, you assume that everything is fine. So when you walk to the back of my dress, there is a gradual subtlety that represents the slow Disintigration of the relationship. I need to now experiment and create sample pieces and also plan how I will hang my final piece.

Burning process...

After the festivities were over, it was time to concentrate on completing my final piece. I finalised which type of fabric I was using and which techniques I was using. 

Heat manipulation is a technique that I am familiar with and have confidence in using the heat tools. such as: A heat gun, soldering iron and iron. As I wanted to achieve a burnt effect on the fabric, I had to experiment with different heat tools to achieve this. A lighter and candle was also used during the experimentation.

 

When it came to burning the dress, I realised that it was very time consuming and taking up too much time to create the desired effect using a lighter. To solve this issue, I had an alternative idea that might be able to burn the fabric faster. Using blue roll really made a difference in the overall burnt look and the black marks that was left on the fabric. I felt this was a good way to resolve this as it really sped up the process.

ITS CHRISTMAS!!!!!!!!

Graduation plan

4 sections of research 

- Further Education

- Business startup

- Travel 

- Employment

After carrying out my large amounts of research for each section, I now feel I have a clearer thought about my lifetime goals. I now know where I aim to go in life and what my ambitions really are. I realised that actually, I want to gain insight into each section. I found this research task really usefull as I have concluded what my short, medium and long term goals are. Also I came to the realisation that I don't actually have to worry about doing EVERYTHING in a couple of years. I can make plans for the future and aim to achieve them.

Disintigration

I developed samples for my studio practise 1 breif - the punctution mark

I thought of good linking idea for developments... By associating fabrics to my theme. 

I relating the meaning of the mind map words by choosing to represent them using fabric. How does this relate to my concept? - The disintigrated fabric represents the deteriation on the relationship. I will show this by altering the fabric to make it look frayed, separated, faded and other relivant words associated to my theme. after developing samples, the next stage will be creating ideas on a final piece. I will need to make it relivant to my theme and think of ways on how to best represent my concept. My inital thoughts on it just now are thinking of a symbol that relates to commitment and use that to highlight the relationship fading away... 

 

The three fabric samples seen above are hessian, silk and just paper.  I used a lighter to burn away part of the fabric, this again represents the disintigration. 

Next steps - Final design ideas.

Essay focus

After carrying out research for my extended essay proposal, I managed to narrow down my essay theme/question. My essay focus is a topic that I feel strongly about and also wish to further my knowledge on the subject.   

                                                               Essay theme

I intend to focus on the power balance between men and women. I will explore how they have changed in society by reflecting back to the 1950’s with reference to their roles and how they are projected within advertisement. 

Before, men and women had specific roles that they were known for. In a married relationship, it was most common for a women to undertake the household chores with the male being dependant on the women’s domestic and nurturing ability. In comparison to nowadays, women are not dependant on a male’s income nor do men rely on women's cooking. I want to create a discussion that highlights how Society is changing as well as the male perception towards women.