Sampling: Hand Prints for Sleeping Beauty

Each dress is going to have a combination of hand printed and digitally printed textile design.
Here are some examples of my hand printed samples for this fairy tale. I have used techniques such as screen printing, discharge printing, devore and foiling.

Dyeing the fabric and getting ready to print!

This is one of the prints I have created.  It has been exposed onto a screen for me to sample with.

The collection of hand prints starting to grow...

The finished collection of hand printed samples for Sleeping Beauty.

Pinks, purples and silvers are the main colours within this dress..

Sleeping Beauty...

This is the first fairytale that I have chosen to look at.  Even though I have looked at this fairytale last semester, I still thought I could develop it much further by looking at different imagery within the story as well as refining some of my old artwork.

The moodboard for Sleeping Beauty.  Depicts the main colours that will feature in the dress: Pink and Purple.  I will be looking at crowns, castles, flowers, fairies and jewels to create a rich body of artwork suitable for develop into digital and hand prints.

Strawberry Hill House

I was really excited to visit Strawberry Hill House.  I had heard that it was full of rich, decorative features such as wallpapers and ceilings.  It did not disappoint!  It was a great chance to gain some first hand research, (something I have found difficult to gain through looking at story books).  Although the whole interior and exterior design is the best example of Georgian Gothic architecture, this was not something that I aimed to gain research on.  I am not producing a Gothic style collection, however I thought that I could gain inspiration from the initial design work and re create my own slightly softer prints suitable for children's wear.

Here are some photos I took of Strawberry Hill House:

Gorgeous ceiling design...

Like the colour combination here, duck egg blue, gold and white.  Reminds me of colours for my 'Snow Queen' dress.

Inspiration for FMP

My main inspiration for my FMP are the fairytales.  I am inspired by the books and the imagery that is associated with each fairytale.  I have researched lots of different children's books from the original 'Grimms Brothers' and 'Hans Christian Anderson' ones to the more modern day versions.  My main focus with these books are the illustrations.  Illustration is a really important factor within my work, I love the hand painted and hand drawn 'look' and I want to create my own little illustrations that I can scan into Photoshop and develop into digital prints which I will then have printed onto the fabric that will be used for my final collection!  This will be a long process but I feel that it will be worth it as I will get to create something different.

Other inspiration for my collection is, of course, flowers! They always feature in my work somehow.  However, I want to develop the way that I am inspired by flowers, not only for their shape but looking at how I can create prints using the flower as a paintbrush.  I think this could create some interesting textures.

My other floral inspiration can be found on my Pinterest page!!

http://pinterest.com/anirose1/florals/

Strawberry Hill House has also inspired me a lot.   Created by Horace Walpole in the 18th Century, it is one of Britain's finest examples of Georgian Gothic revival architecture.  I was inspired to visit this house because it looks so fairytale and fantasy like!  I have never seen a building like it before, full of print, wallpaper, imagery and pattern..but that is another post!

Windsor Castle along with Queen Mary's Dollshouse was also inspirational just because of the castle shape and because I do like dollshouses!  I also looked at the fascinating real life dollshouse built for Queen Elizabeth in 1932 in the grounds of the Royal Lodge.  This was inspirational in a different way because it was built especially for the young royals to play in, so the atmosphere of it would have been breath taking and exciting- something that I want to portray with my collection.

  

Final Major Project (FMP)

I started my FMP at the end of February, carrying on from last semester's project I have kept my theme of 'fairytales' running.  However this time, I will be designing for the Autumn/Winter season and I will be changing some of the fairytales.  The new fairytales I am inspired by this semester are: 'The Snow Queen' and 'The elves and the shoemaker'.  These stories are not so well known but full of rich imagery that I feel is suited to an Autumn/Winter collection. I am developing further: 'Cinderella', 'Snow White', 'Hansel and Gretel' and 'Sleeping Beauty.'  I chose to develop these further because I feel that I can produce more prints that are inspired by the different elements in each story.

I will be designing a girls wear range age 5-6 years.  The luxury collection will include party dresses, capes, coats and leggings as well as hairband accessories.

Here are my initial moodboards, 'the look' I am aiming for and my wall space:

Portfolio Pages...

A few pages from my portfoilo to illustrate my designs...

 

 These are my hand painted illustrations of my dress fronts...

Final Samples for Indigo..

Here are my finished textile samples that will be on sale at the Indigo section of Premier Vision in Paris.  I am really pleased with them and very proud of what I have achieved, considering at one point I thought I had attempted to do too much! I have created twelve textile fronts, six are in the form of a little girls dress front and the other six are just plain fabric fronts.  I chose to present this way so that my designs can be seen for fashion as well as giftware, furnishing fabric, and interior wallpaper etc...



Cinderella designs:

 

Hand printed bodice with a digitally printed skirt and added ruffle...

 Digitally printed fabric front with a hand printed border at the top.

Stitched together to show the contrast of hand printing and digital printing.

Sleeping Beauty:

Hand printed bodice with digitally printed gathered skirt.

Three different patterns make up the skirt design..

Snow White:

 

Hansel and Gretel:

 Princess and the pea:

 

 

Red Riding Hood:

 

 They are finally finished!! Yay!