College Two
Welcome to College Two, Unit X will be beginning next week and you will need to choose which project within College Two to work on. There are five options, Dragons Den, MIF Design Project, Surface Pattern Design, DKNY and Future Intelligence. To help you decide within this book are project outlines. Have a read through these and on the morning of Monday 11th you will be coming in to register your decision. To opt for which project to take part in, come to the third floor of the New Art Design Building on Monday 11th. Where there will be a sign up sheet with your name, on which you will need to make a choice of project. The sign-up sheets will be available from 9am to 12.00pm that day. If you need some advice to help you make a decision, tutors from the projects will be available between 11am and 12pm on the third floor of the New Art and Design Building on Monday 11th.
Project: Dragons Den / Communicate Project Outline: Part 1. Students will work in groups on a professional brief over a 4 week period. These briefs will have a broad based design focus and will explore a range of approaches to creative thinking. Thinking that avoids superficial responses, thinking by relevance and content rather than style and look. A skillset/awareness of typography, use of image, art direction, layout, composition, narrative and spatial awareness is of benefit. During this time there will be a series of interim presentations which will lead to a pitch of the final proposals to a series of Dragon’s, who will travel up from London to attend the sessions. Part 2. Following on from this, there will be an opportunity, individually, to work on a series of shorter/supporting projects that will contribute to a final portfolio submission.
Students: Looking to offer places to designers/visual communicators who are determinedly ambitious in their approach to problem-solving, are open to unconventional responses across the field of design and are interested in creating memorable outcomes. You will need to be equipped to present to a panel of Dragon’s (Design professionals) personally selected by Ian Anderson from Designer’s Republic. The feedback will be ‘very real’ so be ready for a challenge!
Project: Future Intelligence Brief Part One - Cultural Radar Working in groups of two or more, research some of the key external issues that you feel will affect how consumers buy or interact with design in the next couple of years (e.g. environmental issues, economic concerns, cultural events). From this, create a short, illustrated digital presentation that involves all members of the group. This should be very much ideas based – think of it as a trigger that would encourage and motivate someone to work with your information.
Part Two - Think Tank Use your group presentation (with any ideas you found interesting in other groups’) to develop a trend, forecasting or inspiration source. This could be a book, a zine, a film, an online resource or an outcome in any other media. It’s function should be to provide other people working in the creative industries with inspirational source material to engage with their audience in two or three years time. You should undertake significant visual and contextual research, and produce a substantial quantity of development work in a range of media. Part of this should include experimentation with a format for the final outcome and evidence that the clients you are targeting your work at would be receptive to your proposed future intelligence.
Project: The Manchester International Festival Design Project Manchester International Festival (MIF) is the world’s first festival of original, new work and special events. It’s an artist-led, commissioning festival that premiers new works from across the spectrum of performing arts, visual arts and popular culture. This year’s events include theatre productions starring actors such as Kenneth Branagh, Willem Defoe and Maxine Peake; and musical performances by Massive Attack, Goldfrapp and Dave Haslam. We have been invited to work with “Ferrious”, Manchester’s most prestigious interior design retailer, collaborating with them to create two separate hospitality spaces that will become the social hubs of the festival. Venue 1 is a 20metre high tee-pee located in Albert Square, and is the main location for pre & post event parties. The tee-pee design vibe is buzzing, eclectic and informal, and catches the zeitgeist of “creativity in the face of austerity”. It will see you all work together to create a plan for the interior party space, and then populate it with up-cycled furniture pieces made by you from an archway full of furniture we’ve been collecting just for you to work with. Venue 2 is to create the roof terrace for the VIP hospitality marquee; located next to the tee-pee it’s another party venue, but has a much cooler character. Ferrious will be providing key high design furniture pieces for the terrace, and your brief is to plan the space, and design the additional low bench seating & tables to complement the existing seating. In this project you’ll work in smaller interior and production design teams, and pieces you design will be manufactured by our in-house workshop team. We’ll again be supplying the raw materials, which have been sponsored by plastics recyclers “Centriforce”, and after the Festival it is hoped that the pieces will become the furniture for the new Art School roof-top garden.
But there’s a small catch – only one of the proposals can be manufactured. As with all professional design commissions it’s a competition, and you’ll have to pitch your proposals to our very own “Dragons Den”. The Dragons will include movers and shakers from Manchester’s design cognoscenti, alongside representatives from MIF, Ferrious, Manchester School of Art, and material supplier Centriforce; and it’ll be their decision which design gets made. This is a hugely exciting opportunity to work within the heart of Manchester’s most prestigious arts festival, to create concepts and pieces that will be at the centre of events, meet and work with some of Manchester’s most influential creatives, and play your part in creating the experience that for 2 weeks in July, puts Manchester at the centre of the international creative world.
Project: Print/surface Pattern Design. Background Diane Harrison Designs is one of the worlds leading design studios producing surface designs for textiles, wall coverings, rugs, stationary and apparel. They are based in Cheshire with a showroom on 5th Avenue in New York. Established since 1987 they are renowned for their inspiring and relevant surface design, giving their in house designers the freedom and resources to fully explore their individual creativity, exhibiting at trade exhibitions such as Printsource NY, Hiemtextile, Design Job and Indigo (Brussell) The Brief STAGE 1 Working in small design teams, you are asked to explore one of the following categories: 1 EXPLORATION .......... Discovery , media , travel , adventure 2 ECCENTRICITY .......... Diversity , Individualism , 3 INVENTION ........... New techniques , new substrates , experimentation 4 FUTURISM / HISTORY…Combination of two worlds. Mix media. Old becomes new. 5 EVOLUTION ......... Nature , progression , growth. Collectively you will undertake research to produce a visual presentation which documents the groups findings.
STAGE 2 Responding to the initial presentations, choose ‘at random’ one of the categories, developing your own individual interpretation of the theme through drawing and visual research in the form of a sketchbook. At the end of this stage the client expects to see initial design ideas, colours, etc. and you must be able to explain clearly how you ideas relate to the subject.
STAGE 3 The third stage select at random either BEDDING WALLPAPER CURTAINING / UPHOLSTERY Undertake contextual research in the form of a file and tailor your design ideas to suit the category selected. Produce a final collection in repeat including a visualisation.
Project: DKNY This is a live design project with Paul Austin from DKNY You can choose either Menswear or Womenswear. This is a highly creative brief that concentrates on developing a range of 12 looks. The combination of fabrics is essential in intelligent fashion design. This project will consist of workshops focusing on contemporary trims and finishes alongside the development of your own materials and unusual combinations through intensive research and sampling. We want you to bring your varied personalities and ways of working to this brief. How would you describe your way of working? What does your sampling say about you? Do you comment on colour, print, embroidery, texture, knit, shape, Engineering, sustainability, performance, utility or new technology or is it about a unique combination of materials. What’s your agenda within your specialisms? Start extensive research so you can understand and create an interesting capsule collection for DKNY. You will be working in groups but you will all be responsible for every stage of the development of this range of designs and assessed individually. Think about the market level and the customer profile for DKNY. Outcome: The presentation of the following. • Research which includes the development of a narrative /theme in your collection. • Document through drawing and photography everything in depth for example fastenings and finishings. • You will create a varied range of garments with a back up of 200 designs. While these designs will range from initial sketches to final designs, it is expected that you will play close attention to the whole of the garment – detailing, finishes, back and side views where appropriate • Illustrated final 12 looks with Technical drawings. • Extensive sampling and the production of fabrics.
Throughout this unit you will have a reflective approach to your work and its development. This will be evidenced throughout your sketchbooks / design sheets and be based upon both your individual and collaborative practice. You will be presenting your work to Paul Austin of DKNY.