Print in Fashion

1. Print in Fashion ‘The relationship between print & high fashion has never been more potent. For more than 30 years print has been used to support the concepts of structure & shape, designers adhering to the modernist precepts that form follows function & that decoration for its own sake is somehow essentially frivolous.’ The two books I’m primarily using are ‘Print in Fashion’- Design & Development in Textile Fashion, MarnieFogg& ‘Textiles & Fashion’- Basics Fashion Design 02, Jenny Udale. Other books include ‘Printed Textile Design’, Amanda Briggs-Goode & using the resource of Google Books – ‘The Fundamentals of Printed Textile Design’, Alex Russell.

2. “Form follows Function”- Louis Sullivan There are two ways to interpret the phrase “form follows function”: - Descriptive: beauty results from purity of function; - Prescriptive: aesthetic considerations in design should be secondary to functional considerations. In my opinion functionality is important to design particularly in fashion because a garment has to fit well but it isn’t the only thing that should be considered however ‘human beings have an attractiveness bias; we perceive beautiful things as being better, regardless of whether they actually are better’. Aesthetics influence our opinions of products, and we typically find aesthetically pleasing products to be more effective simply by virtue of their aesthetic appeal.’ According to brand director of highly respected fashion chain Topshop, Jane Sherpherdson ‘a print will sell a garment, regardless of whether or not the style is perfect.’

3. The Art & Craft Movement • William Morris was the single most influential designer of the nineteenth century. A key individual associated with the Art & Craft Movementwhich saw decoration as an outlet for craft skills, job satisfaction & invention the movement rejected the idea of poor quality machine produced goods. ‘Ruskin examined the relationship between art, society and labour. Morris put Ruskin's philosophies into practice, placing great value on work, the joy of craftsmanship and the natural beauty of materials.’ Promoting handcrafted over machine manufacture. • Morris chose to work with the ancient technique of hand woodblock printing in preference to the roller printing which had almost completely replaced it for commercial uses. Adjustable Chair by Philip Webb Woodblock Printing William Morris Print

4. William Morris & Louisa Heyworth • Today William Morris remains a continuous source of inspiration for textiles designers today, one such designer is Louisa Heyworth (right). ‘The various historical & contemporary printing processes also have a visual heritage that the print designer can use as a design tool. While some printing methods are now redundant as commercial processes, they continue to have a stylistic influence in contemporary printed textile design.’ the work left has been designed by William Morris & block printed by Thomas Wardle, this Art & Craft floral is typical of their work in both layout & motif. Heyworth's hand drawn imagery which features flowers & other plant life has been developed digitally through CAD to give in my opinion a contemporary look of the traditional Morris prints, enhanced through a natural (colours that are evocative if natural qualities (sky, earth, water) & Neutral (muddy/earthy colours made up of multiple complementaries; because the components are not 100% pure, they create a neutral colour rather than black) colour palette.

5. The Earthly Paradise • ‘Flowers as a source of inspiration continue to be part of the designers vocabulary. William Morris, upheld this preoccupation with nature as a source of inspiration in the 19th century’. His prints continue to undergo periods of revival & have been repeatedly been used for fashion.’ – in my opinion this is testament to his traditional block printed floral designs & the legacy he holds as an English textile designer. British-born designer Ann-Louise Roswald draws her inspiration from flowers ‘I sometimes work from an original flower painting, or just a doodle. The floral motif can be very simple, but enormously effective.’ Flower motifs are the most popular style & therefore most commercial, an aspect of textile design I’m interested in pursuing at university! ‘The plant & flower boom is more than just a passing craze. Their presence is a small victory against noise & visual pollution’- Li Edelkoort, Trend Forecaster. Such reminder about our industrial past & the worlds diminishing natural resources. In my opinion it also rejects the idea associated with futurism- a movement which loved speed, noise, pollution, machine & cities. Speeding car plus light, 1913, GiacomoBalla

6. Liberty of London ‘Liberty has an equally enduring relationship with the floral tradition, Art Nouveau’s sensuous forms to the psychedelic swirls on 1960’s ‘flower power’. Even today with the large scale vibrant florals explored in digitally printed designs. ‘A mixture of highly detailed florals created with graphite, ink, paint & pastels,’ feature right developed into digitally printed designs. This is a theme I’m strongly inspired & influenced by & would consider basing my FMP around such subject, exploring traditional techniques of printing, drawing techniques using primary sources mentioned above & exploration of CAD like the designs (right). • ‘In 1904 Liberty took over a print works that specialised in block-printed silks just up-river from William Morris’ works in Merton. It is because of this print works that the company still has such a large textile archive. New patterns are either designed by the in-house Studio or are commissioned from freelance designers. Each spring and autumn season new textile collections are produced to complement the range of classic designs that are not so bound to the seasons.’

7. Making it accessible • Multiple retailers exist in almost every high street/shopping centre & companies such as Spanish label Zara offer an almost instant take on big-label names. ‘over the last 4 years every type of print has been popular, from florals to spots, abstracts & tribal. A print will sell a garment’- Jane Shepherdson, Brand director at Topshop. • ‘It is only now, in the 21st century, that printed textiles have taken centre stage.’ whether that be florals, geometrics including paisley, stripes, spots, conversational, world as well as abstract or photographic • ‘print designers are now speaking a more common language due to the unifying technologies of TV & internet’- Phillip de Leon.

8. Digital Print • ‘Digital printing is often thought by some designers to produce inferior results to traditional methods.’ • There is a sense that Roswald sees digital printing as ‘unnatural’, unlike the craft process of screen printing. ‘With the screens I love the way that the colour separation overlaps you get an extra colour.’ • However, the most fundamental change that digital fabric printing offers is unlimited colour palettes. ‘it is possible to print a design that has a million colours for the first time’. • ‘Digital printing allows the textile designer to work straight from the computer to cloth with no need for paper designing. Very high definition images can be achieved & many colours printed without the need for numerous screens.’ Something which Liberty has ventured into, where classic archive prints are reworked, revised and updated. • The quality of print we can now produce is now much better than it was & the use of CAD has made it much easier to reproduce & recolour prints’- Shepherdson. • Moreover ‘scanning in original drawings & combining them with other imagery can work well.’

9. Indigo, a trade fair also held in Paris- is a platform for textile designers (mainly print designers to show their textile samples). The samples are shown as collections & are bought by fabric/fashion companies to be put into production’. LCA graduate Florence Colson has experienced recognition via selling designs at this international design fair. • Florence aspires to execute bold, intriguing designs, through bright colour application and ornamental detail, highlighting a harmony between hand done processes and digital print. In my opinion, drawing is a key component in textiles furthermore this combination of translating drawing to designs via digital manipulation is something I highly want to improve on, having experimented with it in my previous project, is something I enjoying practising. ‘The balance of both hand generated and digital techniques makes Florence’s design process versatile and commercially viable, yet designs still remain true to the original illustrations’ is something I would like to achieve, to develop now at a basic level & beyond at degree level with increased complexity. Original drawing scanned into Photoshop, separated onto a screen, printed & the developed back in CAD- final sample.

10. Continuous Development • ‘Print is not enough, now we add to the mix embroidery.’ • Print is continuously being developed & reinvented season upon season, designers are having to re-introduce different techniques & original ideas to stand out from the crowd. • Fortunately for me, print & embroidery are what excites me in this field of textile design with greatest inspiration generated from fashion led- textile designers like Mary Katrantzou (left) who for A/W14 moved away from the digital neon brights of S/S13 in favour of a muted colour palette with embroidered detailing & embellishment. To freelance designers such as Rhianna Ellington (right 3) who combines print with embroidery- hand or free machine the combo is something I most certainly want to do for FMP. Moreover what I love about these techniques particularly the latter is ‘a garment that has been hand stitched and embroidered will never be exactly the same as another garment’ & therefore individual.

11. FMP Inspiration/ Colour Palette? Colour Palette; brights with hints of neon mixed in occasionally with metallic iridescent pastels, to brighten, lighten and freshen the whole thing up. Mary Katrantzou: I want to utilize the technique I already know & play to my strengths not only in textiles techniques but my drawing style as well as producing a body of work based around a brief I’m extremely interested in. I want to push myself by experimenting with digitally printed textiles, using CAD skills which I’m hoping to develop & practise. I thoroughly enjoyed my first textiles project in specialism based around interpreting fashion trends so would consider looking at this again using the Trend magazine, Textile View from the library possibly for Spring/Summer 2015. Floral is the most popular & most commercial style- as I said before is the degree I’m going to study in September at the University of Huddersfield focuses on commercial design. Moreover at time of FMP- Spring moving into summer, primary sources will be in abundance, photography & drawing/painting from observation which I can then stylize in Photoshop which could then be placed on a photo stencil screen. Finally I want to experiment with my strong sense of colour combining with my free machine/hand embroidery skills in creating a range of A3/A4 fabric samples with CAD & drawn versions with design ideas. I won’t be making any garments however would like to do some visuals, make scarves for a collection in satin/silk like fabrics (see image left) but would experiment with other fabrics like cotton/crepe de chine/ organza. Taking advantage of the print/digital resources at Park St. & Queens Gardens.

12. Fabrics for womenswear fashion/accessories market • Pastels & brights colour palette • Season- Spring/Summer • Exploring traditional techniques- screen printing & hopefully digital work- Photoshop. • Combining print with embroidery & embellishment • Like the affect satin silk fabric achieves? • Floral imagery working with primary sources, photography, drawing, painting.