Evaluation for Winter themed bag

For our second project it was based on knitting, weaving & felting, but for our particular theme we had to chose a season. So for my season I chose winter because I think knitting, weaving & felting relates a lot to winter because in winter the fashion is all based on wool, Fur, knitted scarves, hats & gloves, thick layers of knitting, so I felt winter would relate a lot of fashion in this way, so with the bag been an outcome of the project I chose to do Winter. 

When I began my research I took a lot of photographs based around nature and organic aspects, I went to Locke park, Ward Green reservoir, Cannon Hall, Wig-field farm & the fields nature surrounding my area. With these photographs I concentrated on getting a variety because I felt this is important when coming to working onto/into them, I chose bright & vibrant flowers to photograph, I chose cold looking photographs like a branch against a stone cold wall to also give the idea that its for Winter. For my photographs I also gathered some I had took last year when it snowed as last year I took a variety of different weather changing photographs so they were an advantage to work into. It was a shame that it didn't snow during my project but I felt it was important that id gathered some photographs that i'd took myself to go towards Primary research. Furthermore for my primary research there was a observational drawing set up in the classroom as to where we could do different media based sketches and observe the different aspects of the set up, but on the day my class did this I wasn't well so I when I came back I took photographs of the still life as Primary research but I also made my own observational drawing set up. I made a set up with a Banana, kiwi, some bright vibrant flowers, some leaves on a stick, an egg and an rose. The different reasons for all this combination was firstly the Banana & Kiwi was there because fruit represents Nature in a big way by it been grown and I think Banana and especially Kiwi are very interesting things to draw in terms of media, it added color and a meaning to my piece. The flowers and the leaves on a stick were placed on my observational drawing set up because plants & weeds are also a major part of nature along with insects but I couldn't find any insects to place in my set up, but the flowers also really opened up to reveal beauty and detail inside which was interesting to draw, and the vibrant pink flower became a part of my project as I took lots of photographs of it when doing my Primary research. Then I placed the egg in my set up because thats nature within itself and it added a nice background piece and was interesting to draw. But I also took photographs of my set up as evidence and as to work from. So with my set up I did 30 second, 2 minutes, 5 minutes & 15 minutes sketches to see the effect a time limit would have on them and if enjoyed this process or not. I also painted my set up in a detailed lay out which I enjoyed doing because it gave me the opportunity to add color and not quickly sketch like my other media pieces. I enjoyed doing my own set up because I felt I could really work from it and evaluate what objects were important to place in it and what not.

For my secondary research I did a cuts out of mainly newspaper of anything I saw based on nature or Winter or both. I found an interesting cut out of the Mirror, where it showed Polar bears & deers along with lots of action shots of Winter animals which I found interesting.

I also looked into a snowflake book that showed all different variety of snowflakes to include in my research and my visual sheets because some even looked like faces or created images. I researched a lot into Winter Fashion and what it represented, and i found a lot based on big woolly fur coats & big wrap round scarves, so it was all about clothing giving the over-sized look with techniques of knitting within it. I also found that a lot of animals faces are interpreted into winter fashion especially with hats, scarves & gloves which gave me a inspiration to interpretate my own faces into my own work. 

F0r my artists research I first of all Sanhi because her work was based on Weaving and because I found her work so inspiring. Her work was based on weaving with anything that she recieved through her letterbox (menus, advertisements, postcards) to make weaves out of so she was considered towards helping the environment was she also made her work look so inspiring, and then she’d work over the top of them to make faces or create art. She mostly concentrated on celebrities faces as this was a popuar aspect at the time so became something people could relate themselves to. So in my sketchbook I did my own version of her weave in a recycled crisp packet and some material then drew a deer over the top to relate back to my theme and I appreciated the outcome because it showed both my artists influences and my theme.

I also researched Renata who did felting and her work was so extradionary. She created mainly animals with felt and they were created up to such a high standard that they looked like thick photographs, she added such small minor details that it brought her pieces to life and if I had been more time managing I would of done a felting of a peuguin in influence of Renata because I wanted to have another experience at felting and this time do more small details like she showed on her work.

Furthermore, I also researched Wendy who showed knitting through her work, but I chose Wendy because she added components to her knitting which made it even more inspirational, she made animals out of her knitting. One of her favourite pieces of mine is her butterfly knit, when there’s so much detail gone into it, and different thickness of thread to create different patterns.  But I appreciated the fact that she worked back into her knitting so that it wasn’t plain, it was made into art, so I was really inspired by her knit and thats what influenced me to add beads into the front panel of my bag.

Finally I researched Tali Furman who was my favourite artist to research. I included her because I needed an artists who did geometric and symmetry style in there work, and she did this with animals & nature included. I found it interesting to blend my designs into one another and to repeat them because I felt it made the piece more interesting and visually busy. So Tali Furman did exactly this with her work and made is so fascinating and made you really concentrate on her work and look into it and thats the impression I wanted to make with my work. She inspired me to do the repitition on my back panel because she did this on a lot of her own work and added splashes of bright colour within it so I added the bright blue print down the middle to make it more vibrant.

I decided on doing a Toke bag because I wanted each panel to be different as where I couldn’t do this with a slouch bag, I wanted to show different techniques and skill through each panel to show everything I had learned and been influenced by. I wanted to include as many knitting & weaving samples as I could to the best of my ability. If my bag was to be manufactured I think the back panel with the repetition of screen prints would be easy to do because it would be cheap and a quick process to produce but the front panel with the beads may be more time cosuming and more expensive to reproduce so if the manufactures didn’t include the beads and the hand sewing onto the front panel and just using a sewing machine to appliqué on the silk it may be a quicker process. But the recycled jeans on the side panel would be an advantage because there recycled jeans so would be of advantage to the environment.

I think the front and back panel on my bag went very well, the only thing that ruined the back panel was that the pigment paint got through the mesh on the screen print board so it got onto my piece so for next time I will ensure to mask it up accordingly. I also think I showed all my artist influences through my bag because I found artists I really enjoyed researching and took there work into my own hands to represent my own version. I think the side panels were a massive disadvantage to my bag as I didn’t leave myself enough time to do the peg loom so I didn’t get chance to finish my bag which was a shame because to achieve the end product would of been satisfying, but for next time I will make sure to leave myself enough time to do weaving & knitting because it can become really time consuming on your work. If I could change anything it would be to of spent more time on the end product because I didn’t give myself enough time to finish the bag and felt at the end it was a massive rush which made my bag of a lesser standard that I wanted to achieve, so I will ensure for my next project to give myself enough time to ensure an outstanding end product to be proud of, and set myself a task so I know on which days I know what i’m set out to achieve as I think this is important, I just think for this project my time management has really let me down, but I will ensure for this to not happen again. Overall I enjoyed this project and learning the new skills, and felt ive achieved a lot on how to work onto a knit, weave or felt.

My Final design sheet

This was my final design sheet in which I chose colours from one design and techniqes from another to create my final design. On my design sheets I also included advantages & disadvantages to balance up which bag would be the best to create, as I felt this was an important part of gathering my ideas. I also included material ideas so that I knew what kind of material I would be using & why. My design sheets became a very important part of my project as after i'd done all my experimenting I put all my ideas together to chose something suitable for a customer and that also included my ability to produce all the different techniques and combine them.

Weave on peg Loom

This is the process of creating one of my side panels, as my left side panel on my bag was weaved on the peg loom. This weave was a blend of light blue, dark blue & some textured white cotton and I think this was a good use of colours to use because they went well with panels either side of this panel and they all contrasted each other. At this point the weave wasnt finished as I was only half way through it and had to work all way down the thread yet to create the full size of the panel. The only problem I had with this panel was that it was very time consuming and I didnt take this into consideration before I did it so it took a lot of my time up so if I could do the project again I would leave myself more time to concentrate on this panel and do it to a better standard. I would of also added components to this panel like beads of pom pomps.

My plaited bag handles

For the end product of this project we were creating a bag in the style of our theme. So for my bad handles I decided to do plaited ones because I wanted to have handles that were big, fat & wooley to represent winter and it been all about big wooley clothing. So I collected lots of different style of wool and in different shades of winter colours (dark blues, light blues, purples, whites, greys etc), and measured then all at 120cm, I then made sure I had 35 pieces of wool of each plait. Furtheremore, I then plaited the each handle as tightly as I could to ensure there was plenty of strength in the handles for customer standard. I liked the outcome of the plaits because I felt it was something different to do for the handles as it brought winter into it and I liked the blend of the colours the plaits created because it was an even blend of all the colours and the handles were really strong for the weight of the bag. My ideas were for when adding the handles to my bag I would sew them to the outside of the bag and then sew either a large button or attach a bow so you couldnt see the sewing marks where I'd attached the plaits.

Screen print, Heat Transfer & Embroidery

This was one of main samples I really worked into and felt really showed the best of my ability. I did this sample on cotton material as I wanted a strong material to withstand the techniques I was going to apply to it. So firstly in Blue B pigment paint I applied two screen prints, both going into each other to create the effects Tali Furman creates in her, by symetry and geometric effects. The screen prints worked well because the Blue againist the white background made the colours compliment each other so it worked well. Afterwards I then chose the front page of my sketchbook to put onto magic touch paper because i painted a wolf and I felt it was a very detailed and representive piece towards winter, so I transferred it onto magic touch paper to then heat transfer onto my cotton fabric. I placed it in the middle of the deers anterlers to make the wolves face the main attention of the piece. To transfer this wolf onto my orginal Cotton fabric I had to place it into the heat transfer press upside down on the cotton at 180 degree's for 18 seconds to ensure the painting was put onto the fabric. Afterwards I wanted to bring fashion into this piece, so I used embroidery on the sewing machine to sew a face into the wolf with black cotton, I did this because when it comes to winter fashion after the research I did I discovered that it has a lot to do with big wooly scarves interpretated by animals and hats and gloves that have animals faces on them. So I sewed a womans face on top of wolves to show a woman wearing a wolf scarf  which I think looked effective towards bringing fashion into my sample. Overall I really enjoyed doing this piece because I thought the way I presented it was very effective and logical.

Long Weave on Loom

For this weave, i'd already done various weave's on the Loom so I decided to do a longer weave this time to show my ability on the Loom. I created a blend of both dark & light winter colors, but I tried to create a blend by going from dark to light which I think looked effective. For each time I changed my color weave I changed the way in which I ordered the levers at the side to create different patterns for each section of wool. But I tried to do this weave as tight as possible so it really all fitted together and each color blended into the next, so each time I did a weave I pulled the handle along to fit all the weaves into the white thread. I thought this sample was sucessfull and showed the best of my ability in producing a Loom weave.

Felting

For this sample I found the felting technique very difficult to produce because I felt I couldnt do it to the best of my ability with the thickness of felt and the difficulty of producing art out of it. For this process we had to collect sections of felt and place them onto first a towel then a square of bubblewrap all going sideways, then after youve filled the square if bubblewrap I then got more felt but going in a downwards direction. Afterwards I then placed netting onto of the felt and with a bottle spray I sprayed water onto the felt but only getting it slightly damp and not too wet to work onto. Afterwards I then gathered winter themed wool and tried creating a winter tree and then a snowflake, with different blends of winter wool creating deep and light effects by at parts adding more wool than others. Moreover, I then had to role up my design and begin rolling it back and fourth inside the bubblewrap, which ensured the fibres with the felt to gather themselves together. After a few minutes of doing this process I had to place the felt still within the bubblewrap inside hot water then leave my design to dry. Once my design was complete I liked the way in whcih the felt blended into each other but felt I couldnt design art up to a high standard with it because it was so difficult to get the felt to go where id positioned it without there not been enough felt or been too much. But if I could do the process again I would concentrate more on thinner felt and thinner detail.

Weave on Loom

For this sample I did a weave on the loom and I began doing a lot of experiments on the Loom because I felt it was very fast and effective to produce an example on. So with this example I aimed more towards thinner thread and darker thread, and creating different effect with the levers on the side by putting perticular different ones down at a time, which I think looked effective againist thinner thread because you could see all the detail the different levers were creating. I took into consideration that a weave on the Loom may be something I do for my final piece because its so effective and so time consuming, but I also do really enjoy taking part in it and always feel after that its so secure and tight fitted within the white thread.

Weave on Peg Loom

This was one of my least favourite examples because I felt it didnt turn out the way I expected. For a peg loom it is a case of having a plastic block stand with pegs inside it to weave in and out of, but at the bottom of the pegs you have same side lengths of cotton material through little holes creating a double up effect at the bottom of each peg. You then have to knot your choosen wool to begin with at the end and place the note onto the end peg then begin your weaving go in and out of the pegs, but if you wanted to be more experimental you could miss 2 pegs then weave 2 pegs then weave 2 pegs to create a different effect. but with this weave I only did this process with the thick wool because I wanted my sample to stay strong and secure as with thin wool it may create holes and make it less secure. But then when id completed my weave I had to bring my pegs out one by one and place them back in the required holes but behind the weave I had created, then once doing this process with all the pegs I had to tye the remainly thin cotton together 3 sections at a time, so that the weave was secre and wouldnt become loose, but the only problem I discovered was that I did my orginal thin cotton as the cotton to keep my weave together I did the cotton too small so when I came to tying them together it bunched all my design together so you couldnt see all the seperate wool and design which ruined the sample slightly but overall I did enjoy doing it and the experience.

Cardboard weave

For this example I did a Cardboard weave on a smaller cardboard cutout than the one I made myself, so this was the first example on the cardboard weave I produced. When producing this example its a case of wrapping some thin wool around the cardboard to be the base ad main strength of the weave and then gathering the wool to weave through the thin wool. I made sure to stick to my theme of winter and ensured to have a blend of blues & purples, but for this perticular weave I wanted to create a winter sunset, so I started with pale yellow in the middle to create a interpretation of the sun and then began a colour blend in blue & purple to gradually get darker. I liked this idea because I felt it did look like a winter sunset within a weave. I also liked doing this process because you can experiment and weave anything through the cardboard but I also feel that the sample isnt strong enough as I didnt put enough wool into the end of the weave before getting it off the cardboard so it was slightly loose which made it of a lesser standard.

Knitting Sample

Knitting was one of my favourite samples to do, but one of the most time consuming. I enjoyed knitting because I felt it encouraged you do more once you realised you were getting somewhere with the process, I really envied the pattern it created, the strength of the fabric and the way in which it was so thick so it would be more of an advantage towards various techniques over the top of it. I did my knitting in Blue wool as it represented my them but If I could do it again I would of bought more wool in various winter colours and built it up in texture and techniques or even added componenets within the wool to make it interesting and unique like Wendy did within her work and also would show my artist influences. If I would of been more time managing with my bag I would of done one sad panel knitted but its such a time consuming I may of had to spend a lot of time on it. But overall I felt I learnt a lot of skills and experience within this sample and I really did enjoy doing it and the outcome.

Screen print and heat transfer

The material I used in this example was Cotton because I wanted to do texhniques on it that are quite heavy techniques so I need thick and strong material. So I firstly dyed the material with Blue B procion dye but I added water to the dye to make it lighter so the colours I added on top would stand out and not blend into a dark background. After dying my fabric I pressed it in the Heat Transfer press at 180 degree's for 18 seconds to ensure the dye was pressed into the fibres then I washed the fabric under cold water for a few seconds to get rid of any loose fibres. Furthermore, I then did 3 screen prints each next to each other in Black pigment paint and felt the black and Blue B background really complimented each other so that the black revealed all the screen prints detail and outlines. Then after pressing this on the heat transfer press again to ensure the pigment paint was within the fibres, I then did a heat press. With this I chose a little experiment I did inside my sketchbook which was for Sandhi as her work is a case of recycled things espically objects she gets through her letterbox. So with a crisps packet and some recycled material I created a weave then over the top I drew a detailed reindeer to represent my theme, I felt it looked really well because it combined artists inspiration and my theme. Then with this I had my piece photocopyed and transferred onto magic touch paper, moreover I then had to put the magic touch paper upside down onto my Cottom fabric and then pressed the fabric and the magic touch paper between the two metal panels at 180 degree's for 18 seconds and then when pulling the lever to pull apart the two metal panels I then had to peal the magic touch paper away from the cotton fabric at a quick pace to reveal the piece on the fabric. I thought it looked really good and interesting because i did it over the top of the middle design so it overlapped it and caused an interesting geometric type effect. I just wish I could of blended the wave more into the background because it just looks like a block colour, so I wish i would of repeated the heat transfer a few more times.

Puff binder print on Viscos Silk

On this example I started working towards what techniques would be on my bag and I began experimenting into my samples even more, even if it just meant changing the colour of something or the position its in. So I tried Blue B puff binder onto Viscos silk because I envy the way the puff binder looks against the Viscos silk, because at first I thought the Blue B would blend too much into the white background and they wouldnt create a contrast, but because the puff binder has so much texture against the Viscos silk it worked really well and to add an even better effect I repeated the print to show firstly my influences from Tali Furman and then to outline the detail and outline even more. I then puffed up the puff binder which caused the difference in the texture and the colour but it went very well.

Screen print onto Azeta fabric

For this sample, I chose to do a different type of fabric to see how the techniques worked & looked against it. So I chose Azeta fabric which again is very delicate and thin like Viscos to work on, but by working on Azeta I would learn more on its properties. So I did a screen print in Brown & turquoise pigment paint, and did half of the pigment paint on each side of the print to show the effects of the colours on the material which is making the colours darker and losing their colour because there against  a dark background. For the background I dyed it in Blue B procion dye to see the effect the screen prints had against it, but before adding the screen prints I pressed the material in a Heat Press at 180 degree's for 18 seconds to press the colour into the fibres then I washed it to get rid of any loose fibres. This was my least favourite example because the colours look mucky and discoloured on it and I felt I didnt work on it enough, If i could of changed anything it would of een to add more techniques to it but I felt the matieral was too thin and delicate to add more techniques to.

Repeated screen prints onto Viscos fabric

For this sample I used Viscos fabric because I didnt want to stick to Cotton fabric throughout the whole of my project, I wanted to experiment the effects of techniques onto fabrics with different properties. So I therefore used Viscos knowing its a very thin and delicate fabric to work onto or into so I decided to only do screen prints onto it because any weaving or knitting into it would ruine the fabric and the strength of it. So with black pigment paint I did a screen print three times and each time I moved the board slightly along the material and ran the squeegee up and down the board 3-4 times. I felt this piece went sucessfull because it showed all the detail and showed my artists influences from Tali Furman and her ways of geometric, symetry and repitition of designs to create interesting work.

Loom with screen prints

For this experiment I wanted to overlap my ideas & techniques and continue making unusual winter themed pieces. So therefore I went on the Loom and did a weaved piece with a blend of think and thin wool and it varied in colours from blues to purples. With the levers at the side of the Loom I tried all different ways of creating a weave by having one at a time down and slowly working my way along and then back, holding 2nd and 4th down at a time or alternitively 1st and 3rd, holding 1st and 4th down or alternitively 2nd and 3rd etc. I enjoyed using the loom because I felt it was a fast and effective way of doing a weave because it ensured the weave was secure and tight fitted and you could easily changed the wool/thread you were using, you could even put material through the Loom if you wished to. Afterwards I then did a turquoise screen print over to the top coming slightly off the left side in pigment paint, but I felt it didnt show up as well as I would of hoped because its clashing against the background colors a little bit so at certain points of the weave it blends into it. Moreover I then did a black pigment paint screen print coming off the right hand side, which looked more effective because the black complimented the background colours to make the outline and detail of the print stand out, and also because the weave was so tight and even you could see the detail better instead of a cardboard weave where its less tight. Finally to finish my experiment off I made blue puff binder and did a screen print coming more onto the weave and I thought this looked effective over the black because the black against the blue puff binder contributed to it standing out and after i'd put the heat gun on the puff binder for 30 seconds it puffed up to cause a texture which made it stand out even mre. I enjoyed doing this piece becaue it gave me the opportunity to experiment various techniques and I learnt the outcomes, and the difference a cardboard weave and a Loom weave has against screen prints.

Cardboard weave

For my second project I began experimenting with weaving, knitting, felting & overlapping these techniques to create different unique designs. So for this experiment I created my own cardboard weave in which I had to cut small parallel squares out of either side and then round the board wind thin thread to create the panell to keep the weave together and to create the weave. So I then collected different material & wool with different textures & patterns to weave through the cardboard weave. I used fur, think purple wool, winter themed material etc, and I made sure it all represented winter and its cold but think and wooly colours. Afterwards I wanted to overlap my design with more techniques and experiment more into the weave, so I therefore did a screen print in Black pigment paint over the top. I liked this piece because the cool and light background really contrasted against the weave to make the screen print stand out, but because it was a weave and had a vary varied texture to it it broke up the screen print a bit so you couldnt see the detail and the outline to a very good standard, I think thats the only thing that ruined this experiment but apart from that I really enjoyed taking the cardboard weave into my own hands by creating my own and overlapping the techniques.