Smallness - Senior Process

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My senior collection is about the interaction of light and wind and how, when connected together, they create a transcending feeling of smallness.

I almost used broken shards of glass as one of the main elements. It was a time in my life where I didn’t feel entirely whole. But after advice from my mentor and praying and searching, I decided on something so much better.

What I really hope is that the materials, together, will interact with the true elements of this design: the wind and the light and the unexplainable aura that resonates from them. If I can do this, I can echo to others the absolute greatest feeling I’ve ever experienced—the feeling of staring up at the night sky, watching the stars reflect their light, feeling the wind against my skin, and suddenly realizing how amazingly small we are.

Harmony in Head

It’s midway through the day and I’m thinking three rows ahead, down at my knitting. It’s been 6 hours and whoa. I have completed, wait for it…wait for it… Three. Whole. Inches. 😐  This is a decent accomplishment, but I’m not admiring these fresh stitches. I’m calculating those three inches, into hours, and multiplying them by the knitting yield of the full piece, and then dividing that by seven and then counting down the few remaining days I have left until my critique with the dean. (10 days).

At this rate I should finish this single layer of my first look by, mm, next Tuesday.

I realize this same time comparison has actually been going through my head all day on repeat.  Inch by inch, hour by hour, day by day, minute by minute stitch by stitch by cup of coffee, by stich, I have been calculating my deadlines. The moment when I finish this piece, so I may move onto the next and begin calculating again, but as exhausting as it is to think about and as exhausting as this is to read, you should all know that there is a time when this chess game in my head quiets.

Two days a week, on Monday and Wednesday mornings, I have an art history class and it is my favorite moment of the entire week. It’s a time when I get to sit and pause and just look at artwork.  It’s so soothing. I’m not thinking in terms of a plan and a deadline. There’s no pressure. My boyfriend and I sit aside each other, both of our minds moving a mile a minute, admiring art, coming up with new ideas, and laughing at our professor’s ridiculous, interpretive, dancing. Yes, this really happens.

It’s a pause.  It’s a soak.  I always have a pen and paper ready, but not to write down the names of the artists or the dates of the paintings we cover in class; I have an entire notebook willed with new ideas.

As an artist, we need pauses. Soaks. We need to be inspired without the pressure of creating. Because when you’re not looking for something beautiful, is often when you find beauty in things the most.

Here are some of my favorites art pieces that I should have written in my notebook:

How to Whimsify Your Boring, Old Hallway👼💫

Step 1: Forget everything you know about crafts

The art and act of crafting is not at all what most people think.

You could be a fool with your hands. Your cutting skills could be seriously lacking. Your gluing abilities might not be so hot and you may have little-to-no- spare time. That’s okay, gurrrl—turning a dark, horrible hallway into a whimsy wonderland requires none of these things! There’s only one thing you absolutely need to create another world, that is, an idea that excites you.

This will not be your typical how-to.

Step 2: The Vision

When I’m feelin’ crafty but don’t have a project in mind, its hard for me to relax. I always have to be doing something with my hands, but I always remind myself that it’s never good to force something. In the end, the vision and the feeling has to come first.  

After 12 + hours a day pattern drafting and knitting at Eckburg, coming home and opening the door to a long, treacherous, empty, barren, dark, quite, scary hallway was kinda the icing on top of the workaholic cake. So. I decided to remind myself of one of my favorite feelings, whimsy💫

Once you know what feeling you want to create, hone in on that vision, beebee! If you have a strong mind’s eye, this may be easy, but for others, focus on that feeling; search online and look for inspiration. Create a mood board if you have to.

For me, I thought about friendly clusters of butterflies guiding me kindly, safely, to my bed so I may promptly pass out in peace. Motivation! 👏

Step 3: Choosing your elements

Now, I'm not going to lie to you all. I really broke the bank for this one, guys. I used some pretty high tech stuff (printing paper, masking tape). Which leads me to Bonus Tip number one:

Stay within your budget. And know that there’s almost always a much cheaper version of the material you’re envisioning. For me, construction paper was tempting, but in the end, borrowing copious amounts of paper from the printers at my school just made sense. 😊 ✌😋

TIP 2: Keep it consistent! More important than the materials themselves is consistency. Stolen sheets of computer paper may be paired well with masking tape found in a drawer! When creating a new world, the components need to create harmony.

Step 4: Execution

It’s all in the details on this one, son. 😎  The subtleties. The little stuff. Let the experience be organic. Don’t make every element a piece from a cookie cutter. Don’t feel limited to the designs you find online. Vary them in size and shape a little. Make some mistakes. I certainly didn’t cut all of these little butterflies perfectly. Some of them really suck. They aren’t clustered together into perfect crescendos or anything like that, and I didn’t have the principles of design floating around in my head constantly when placing them. I just had fun and cut away and taped and relaxed. Don’t worry if you mess up. You’ll be surprised: an imperfection up close can seem so horrible and ugly, but when you step back and look at your finished project as a whole, its these imperfections that makes it all beautiful.  

💫💫💫💫💫💫💫

A Midsummer Night's Dream: The Process

Last quarter I took Apparel 1 (draping), and I designed my final project around the inspiration of A Midsummer Night's Dream and the era of the 1920s.  I thought that I'd share with you a bit of the design process that went into making it.  I'll share more of the draping and sewing process in the next post when I show the final garment.   

Below is the initial croquis.  I drew over 40 different design variations and picked the one that I liked best.  Below is the one I chose.

Along with the final look, the class was told to pick four other looks to go with the one design to create a five-piece mini capsule collection.  Below is the five look lineup that I chose.

Flats were drawn after the muslin stage.

During the time of making the garment we had to keep a process book.  Here are a couple different texture pages from it. 

Below is a page of a process book that I keep my photography ideas in. The whole time I was envisioning a shoot with white paper butterflies so I sketched it out.

Sneak peek of the final shoot:

I'll be posting the final dress later this week!  I’m very excited to finally share it with you!  

Inspiration: Painters

I've been home from school for the past few weeks now and it's been absolutely wonderful to be back in Indiana!  After being required to pour out so much creativity during the school year, I've used these first few weeks to catch up on time to research new inspiration.

My mom received her degree in painting so I've been looking through her old reference books.  Here are some paintings that caught my eye:

 George Hendrik Breitner

  

 Charles Webster Hawthorne

 

   Robert Lewis Reid

Henri de Toulouse-Lautrec

Are there any artist that you would recommend for inspiration?  I'd love to look them up!  

Dear Suzy

Oh goodness, it's been far too long!  I honestly can't believe that it's November already.  So much has gone on in the past two months that it feels like a blur, and I can't even pinpoint certain events to you (isn't that strange how that works?).  This last Thursday was Halloween and I was Suzy from Moonrise Kingdom.  While I was watching that movie last year, I realized  that I already had her entire outfit - saddle shoes and all!  It was incredibly convenient that I have a love for the 60s, because it very useful this week.   

Did you dress up for Halloween?  If so, what did you dress up as?  Do you have any pictures anywhere? Costume pictures are my favorite!

My Instagram

By the way - have you seen the trailer for Wes Anderson's new film?  It looks absolutely brilliant! 

 

My Room / Sewing Studio

About a month ago I was going through my room because I was starting to organize the items that I'd need to take/throw out once I'd move to Savannah (I just arrived yesterday!).  Then I thought that it would be fun to show you all what my room looks like, since so much of my time has been spent in this space.  I'm always either sewing, editing photos, or working on some kind of project in here.  

When I was in the 3rd grade I made the decision that my room HAD to be lime green.  If you walk into my house, even though my my bedroom is the last one down a long hallway, you will know it is my room!  It's easily one of the first things your eyes will go to, because the green walls casts this alien glow into the hallway whenever my door is open.  It's a wonderful thing.

                                  ^This is the station where I spent most of my time at.

My room is really more of a work studio than a bedroom.  Yes I slept there, but I even moved my bed into my closet so that I could have more space.  I did this shortly after I first started sewing in the 7th grade.  At first my sewing machine was in my closet.  I had a little desk set up, but even then, I needed more floor space to pattern draft.  That was when I made the best decision I ever made, and moved my mattress into my closet.  The bed frame was too big to fit into that space so my bed is actually my mattress on top of several  plastic storage tubs.   It's not the best for back support, but at least I was able to sew! 

^My closet shelves store most of my fabric.  My bulkier fabrics are tucked away in random corners of my room.

^Where the blogging usually happened

^I used cardboard as a makeshift cork board and nails are holding up my sewing tools.  

Over the years my room became a place where I've loved to create and most of my days were spent in there working.  Right now I'm in Savannah and I've been slowly collecting items for my new room while also waiting for my items from home to come in through the mail.  Those boxes should be arriving in the next few days.  A few of the boxes are my sewing supplies and fabrics, which I can't wait to test out on my new sewing machine (it's a beaut)!  I'm excited for the possibilities of my new room, but I'm also going to miss my old space - including the alien, green glow! 

  

Have you posted any photos anywhere of your room or studio?  If so, comment with a link!  I always love looking at photos of how people decorate their personal space!   

My Inspiration Journal

Old hardcover books are one of my favorite things.  Not only are they cool looking, but I love to hollow them out and use them as journals.  Sometimes I don't even hollow them out (like in this one), but I just start adding pictures straight to the pages.  Sometimes I feel like I forget the inspiring images that I have saved to a folder on my computer.  Believe me - I have folders and folders of saved inspiration photos, but there's something special about having a book to flip through.  Here are a few of the pages from this year's journal.

This journal is now full, but I just made a new writing journal from an old book the other day.  I'm starting to get into writing a lot more in journals, instead of pictures.  I found an old diary I kept when I was in the 3rd grade.  Sometimes I forget how much I've changed, and it's such a cool reminder to look back and read some of the things that I've written in the past.  

  My new journal looks exactly like the 2nd to last picture in this post - only that's going to be the style of the whole journal.  I recommend making one yourself!  All you have to do is find an old hardcover book, take a glue stick and paste a new piece of paper over the words - then write!  It's always so satisfying when a journal is completely filled.  You might even remember this inspiration journal I made and wrote about a couple years back.

If you're able to find time to keep a journal I highly recommend it!