EEEP

As of this week we have been so kindly reminded by our lecturers that we actually DO NOT HAVE MUCH TIME LEFT....

That officially means no more umming and ahhing over small decisions when patternmaking. My knew motto is 'get it done now, fix it later' (she says jovially with a clenched jaw..). I actually had a very productive week, and remembered to take a photo of my cape toiling in progress.

Getting the shape perfect and drawing in design lines

 

Trying out the design with different weights and colours of fabric

Holidays are coming up in the next week, and after them it is go go go time! Wish me luck!

slowly but surely

Patternmaking, toiling, patternmaking, toiling. It's all I think about when I go to sleep and wake up! Finally finished perfecting my patterns for my main coat, a skirt, a pair of short shorts, and I am currently working on a blouse. I still need to experiment with embellishment, but I think I would prefer to get the pattern making and toiling out of the way first. 8 more garments to start on, sigh.

The time we have to do this is rushing by incredibly fast, but I do have to say I am enjoying it, and am already getting excited and nervous for the end result and parade!

Photos of progress coming soon!

Starting pattern making and toiles stage

For the last two weeks now we have began the pattern making and experimentation stage. I decided to work first on one of my favourite outfits, the one which I would most likely use for our photoshoot come the beginning of August. This outfit consits of a lace mini skirt, blouse, and interesting panelled swing coat, which has been occupying all my time for the last 4 lessons. Hopefully tomorrow I will finally have finished my pattern for the coat, and will be able to toile it up early next week. If I ever remember to bring my camera to class I will be posting photos of my sampling progress.

So far so good :D

The catch up/ first freak out

I'm sorry to say that since I have been soo busy with this whole ordeal (as I am now starting to call it) that I havn't yet caught you up on my recent activities. So to get you up to speed I will tell you a short summary.


As everyone became busy little bees designing their collections, I was stuck.  I really wanted to mix unusual patterned fabrics together as a main focus of my range, but could find nothing that I liked in Adelaide, and without knowing my fabrics I couldn't design a thing! So I quickly decided that Melbourne would be the hot spot for great fabrics, and the week long road trip began.

Getting names of fabric shops in Melbourne from my fellow fashion student friend Emma, I had a huge list to get through in only three days; the fourth day was to go back and buy my final decisions.  Long story short, after many samples, freak outs, fabrics shops, late night designing, I found many fabrics that I loved, none of course that could work for my collection.  I was beside myself, kept changing my mind every ten minutes, but some how in the last three hours of the last day I chose my fabrics, and surprisingly was happy with them.

Back in Adelaide I was running out of time for the due date of our range board.  I thought that with my fabrics chosen designing would be a piece of cake! Instead many a piece of actual cake was eaten as comfort as still no drawings emerged. As a student designer your mind is always full of outfits and designs you want to make but don't have the time to, so how is it when you are allowed to design and make whatever you heart desires your mind forms a mental road block? Three words for why.

Life is cruel.
But you eventually get past it, and things get better. In my case it did, and now I have designed a wonderful collection of 6 outfits, 12 garments, and I love it! All in the nick of time might I add (only two days late of deadline).

Here is a preview of one of my fabric choices.

mmmm mustard wool suiting

Safari style cotton print