If you read the part 1 of "discovering fashion" you know what this series is all about. But, in case, you didn't read it "discovering fashion" is basicly a documentation of my university journey studing fashion and footwear desing. Therefore, everything you see, hear and read in these posts are my experiences of what it is like to study fashion but also plainly just showing you what we fashion students do and learn in our studing programs. So, if you are someone who is considering to study fashion desing or is just curious about what I learn, I try my best to tell you everything worth knowing in this series.
The first period "General principles of desing" started on late August and lasted untill the very late October 2019. During the slightly over two mounths period we learned a number of things from what is creativity to different tools we can use to present our ideas such as drawing or moodboards. However, I am only tellling you about the most excitinig classes and assignments because otherwise this post would grow too boring and way too long.
Principles of drawing
In this course we learned about different drawing and painting techniques as well as got familiar with various papers, tools and supplies used in art.
(Also note that I am no painter or drawer but I tried my best.)
Principles of the conseption of idea
In this course we learned about what is creativity, what are the things that hinder creativity and what are the enviroments that help to develop new ideas. We also tried different ways of producing ideas which we could use as tools to work with when we might be struggling to come up with something new and interesting.
The first tool for coming up with new ideas is to cut a hole in a paper shaped like the item you want to create. Then you put the hole against different backgrounds of paintings, pictures, moodboards and fabrics etc. to see what kind of an object the paper and the background creates. After that you paint or draw the whole item you created with the cutted paper and background.
The second way of coming up with new ideas is to make other objects into something else. For example, here I have turned a ballet tutu, a 1920s necklace, a lonic pillar, a wine glass and an old telephone into shoes.
Desing lab
In our school we have three different major subject to study: glass and ceramics, footwear desing and clothing desing. Each student chooses one main subject which she/he is going to focus on her/his studies for the next four years. In this first perioud we got to try all of the different subject in case someone wanted to change her/his choice (we had to choose the one of the main subjects before we started our first perioud). Also, I think we visited all of the classes because it's important to know what your other classmates are doing in their studies.
In case you were wondering my main subject is footwear desing, which I am not going to change after visiting all the other classes. However, I did enjoy everyone of them.
Glass lab
In the glass lab we were suppose to create jewelry using these long glass pipes above or some flat glass that you can see in the next picture. My idea was to make a bracelet out of white, clear blue and pink glass pipes but as you can see my circles didn't survive in the oven. However, my other creation, a lilac necklace, was thankfully a success.
Ceramics lab
The ceramics lab was a really fun lab but required a lot of steps from shaping our fruits from clay to burning them in the oven and then from coloring them to burning them in the oven again. On top of everything my pumking looks like a bad tomato but I guess it's fine. All in all, I am quite happy about visiting the ceramics lab because it's so far from the things I normally do at school.
Footwear lab
I know... we didn't make shoes! but leather is a very common material to use in footwear, so getting to know how it behaves was insightful and surely usefull when thinking about my upcoming studies.
So, instead of shoes we made these simple envelope bags that we got the decorate according to everyboby's individual style. I chose this blue leather which, unfortunately, was a little bit too stiff. Therefore, it was harder to sew it together. But in the end, I like the fact that the bag doesn't lose its shape so easily, and it looks absolutely fabulous with silver hardwear.
Clothing lab
In the clothing lab we made everybody's all time favorite, classic t-shirts. First we chose the shape we wanted to make. I went for a boxy siluette instead of a more fitted one, and for fabirc I just wanted the classic white. Then I just had to cut out the fabric and finally sew my t-shirt together.
To be honest, I was a little bit nervous about sewing the t-shirt because I hadn't sewn in six years. However, it wasn't as hard as I thought it would be and in the end my t-shirt looked quite nice, if I do say so myself.
(Other classes we had to take were on basics of communication and digital learning environments but I didn't want to feature them here because the content from these classes would be quite boring for you to read.)
Thank you so much for reading!
Siiri