Year two Week One

After a summer off, I am back for the start of year two of college. We have starting off by unboxing our new sewing machines and learning how to use them. This was useful as it meant that when it came to sewing my lessons, I would know what to do so I could start immediately. This was my first time using a sew machine with a touch screen, so it was interesting to see that I had so many stitch options and ow it was even able to embroider icons/ images onto fabric. We then constructed sewing machine covers for these so that we could hold the handle through the top and have pockets to store the feet. I found this a useful task to do as it helped to ease me back into the class structure. Whilst doing this ask it allowed me to practise my bias binding cutting and sewing as this is something I used to struggle with, keeping the stitches on he buas edge. I sew quite a few bias binding around the sewing machine backs in order to keep the edges neat and all of them went well because I made sure, they were pressed before sewing them making the bias tape more set in its position making it easier to sew it accurately. I also topstitched every machine cover when the handle comes through. This made me focus on accuracy and neat sewing as this is a part that is very seen. As I wanted them to be done in time, as once this was done others could add other parts, I made sure my sewing was quick but accurate, this helped me to understand these new machines and get back into sewing with a bit of a deadline.

 

We continued this into our textiles lesson, where we met the first years on this course, it was nice to meet the and o talk about what they’re interested in. When meeting them we assisted them into finishing off he machine covers. This was useful as it made me work on communication through teaching them how to sew with the new machines, introducing myself and explaining the instructions. I found this ask not bad as I was quite used to this from my work experience, as the students n the first year where in secondary school when I was at work experience, so I was fairly comfortable talking to the student I was with.

In our next pattern cutting lesson we made continuous strip plackets. I found the demonstration to be slightly confusing but when putting it into practice I found the technique to make sense. I had already made something like this when making skirt samples, but this was good to refresh as it made me learn how to use this as a cuff and my sample this time was more successful of my developed accurate stitching and how I managed to make the fabric lay flatter this time through taking more time to be precise when sewing it.

 

In textiles this week we started making portfolio work by firstly going through our old work, I found this helpful as it made me think about what I need to develop to be out in. To make this a successful portfolio page I took my fruit work from year one and started to design an illustration to make my design look more interesting. At first, I found this difficult to not make the face too literally or look too much like a face, so I decided on the pomegranate fruit to be the head. I experimented with what the style should be like using my left, right hand and continuous line or sketching. I decided on continuous line drawing the face as I like how to helps me to not get caught up o the detail of the face and how it makes it look more abstract. When drawing the body of this I found that it looked good with a log thin neck to contrast the large wide head to balance it out. I also learnt to keep the body longer to create fashion proportions. Over the weekend, I added designs to this through collaging magazine strips onto the body after trying to digitally draw the designs and not liking the outcome.

 

In my own time at home, I sewed a Marie sleeve as I saw this in my 19^th century fashion book and I wanted to test it out. When doing this, I learnt that using elastic works well to create gathers which once worn created volume. If I were to do this again I would make the sleeve pattern longer as the elastic and volume made it further up the wrist, so I should add more length. I really like the way that this turned out as I like how it creates the bulb shape throughout the arm.