Introduction -‐ A welcome and a salute from the team Salut
Welcome to our programme and our end of year handbook, which highlights the joys, accolades and dedication that forms part of experience of the BA (Hons) Printed Textiles & Surface Pattern Design cohort.
Documented and assembled in March, we seek to provide you dear reader; a snapshot of our experiences and journeys. It is a visual narrative that seeks to summarise our passion, our creativity, our curiosity and our professionalism. As a team, indeed a tribe, of printers, dyers, illustrators, stylists, colourists, makers and creators in the widest sense, we have shared values, ideas and amused ourselves with the joy that is design. We are incredibly proud of our efforts here, for three years we’ve toiled, laboured and just occasionally partied our way to creating a reputation. A reputation for success, based on innovation, ardour, commitment and camaderie. Within this yearbook, you’ll see more than just a ‘business card’ of each individual, we aim to offer you insights to events and experiences that underpin our whole programme philosophy, how we work and importantly, why we are ready for the wider world of employment, enterprise and creative ventures. This book then is both an introduction to us and a fond farewell to our graduating cohort. Whether you be a prospective student, employer or friend, we invite you to join us in toasting what has been another vintage year. The guys and gals have worked their socks off, an excellent gang indeed and we are incredibly proud of our success Team Textiles
Course Structure
Year One Design for Print Design for Digital Output Design for Paper Design for Context 1 Context of Practice Personal and Professional Practice 1 Year Two Design and Innovation Design Direction Responsive
Context of Practice 2 Personal and Professional Practice 2 Year Three Context of Practice 3 Personal and Professional Practice 3 Extended Practice
Our Studios – A space to be wrong The creative ‘buzz’ emanating, from our studio exudes energy, enthusiasm and a sense of community that is palpable from the moment you enter our studios. Housed in an extensive open format design studio, which accommodates all three year groups, (and importantly for each student, your own individual work areas), the arrangement promotes a communicative, collegiate and thriving creative atmosphere. Our studios afford students a place to see the logical progression from year to year, to contextualise their practice, the studio environment really supports our creative and skills development, providing a forum to showcase ideas, to explore through drawing and making as well as fostering a sense of being part of a community of designers. In essence our studio is a place to grow, make mistakes, find a direction, change our mind and identify what we want to explore next. It’s a free space of curiosity to seek doing more than merely ‘good’ work. ‘Forget about good. Good is a known quantity. Good is what we all agree on. Growth is not necessarily good. Growth is an exploration of unlit recesses that may or may not yield to our research. As long as you stick to good you’ll never have real growth.’ Bruce Mau – Manifesto for growth No. 2
Prizes/Accolades
Fact is, we rather like winning prizes. It makes us feel special to know that we’re appreciated. Recently we’ve had the following success
Academic Year 2012/13 success so far...
• Sofa.com -‐ Winner of Sofa.com’s ‘Emerging Designer 2013’ -‐ http://www.sofa.com/emerging-‐designer-‐winner • •
EGE in conjunction with FX magazine(Denmark) -‐ Finalist NUVEAU DESIGN Competition 2012-‐13 (International) – 3rd Prize http://www.nd-‐competition.com/index.php?id=1702
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Textile Society Undergraduate Student Bursary Award – Winner of the Textile Society Student Award http://www.textilesociety.org.uk/bursaries-‐awards/student-‐bursary-‐ winners.php Society of Dyers and Colourists – 2013 Northern Region -‐ Runner Up Bradford Textile Society Competition: This year, we are currently progressing well in the Competition with yet another host of successes including: o
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WORSHIPFUL COMPANY OF DYERS AWARD (Fashion) -‐2 Commendations • PRESTIGIOUS TEXTILES AWARD (Interiors)2nd Prize CLOTHWORKERS' FOUNDATION AWARD (Fashion) 2 commendations CLOTHWORKERS' FOUNDATION AWARD (Interiors)2nd Prize and Commendation BRADFORD COLELGE TEXTILE ARCHIVE AWARD (Archive) 3 Commendations ASSOCIATION OF FASHION & TEXTILE COURSES AWARD (Fashion) 1st Prize CLOTHWORKERS' FOUNDATION AWARD (Material Construction) 2nd & 3rd Prize and Commendation
SURTEX New York 2013 – For unbelievable 3rs year in a row now, one of our girls has just been announced as a winner of this prestigious high profile event set in New York. This year, applicants were asked to design a surface for any product/material that promoted and related to wellbeing and healthcare. The prize includes a stand at Surtex Trade Fair in the U.S., promotion and networking with leading industry buyers and employers. Supurb Design Brief 2013 – 2nd Place http://www.supurb.co/#!supurb-‐award/c1k5j CSI colour award 2012 – Finalist Beta Fashion -‐ Winner February 2013, January 2013 and 3 other winners http://www.betafashion.com/competitionratedesign.aspx?SubmissionID=6724 http://www.betafashion.com/competitionratedesign.aspx?SubmissionID=6566
2012 Successes •
Bradford Textile Society Competition: We had a rather jolly good innings at this (23 prizes/commendations along with a few thousand pounds in prize money) – the relevant results are:
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ASSOCIATION OF FASHION & TEXTILE COURSES AWARD (Fashion) 1st, 2nd and 3rd Prizes plus 4 Commendations CLOTHWORKERS' FOUNDATION AWARD (Material Construction) Commendation 2 ‘Travel Bursary Award to Paris, Indigo’ Best in show Grand Prize Winner, Overall Award which went to the BA (Hons) Printed Textiles and Surface Pattern Design Dept for its success across the board of the competition. -‐News article here: http://www.leeds-‐art.ac.uk/home/news-‐ events/news/article/our-‐textiles-‐department-‐wins-‐outstanding-‐achievement-‐ award/
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SURTEX New York 2012 – Winner http://www.leeds-‐art.ac.uk/home/news-‐ events/news/article/international-‐competition-‐win-‐for-‐poppy/ and here http://www.surtex.com/News/designextWinners/tabid/296/Default.aspx A fabulous and very high profile event set in NY, to design fabric and papers for a given market, in which, we were both the winner and the Grand Prize Winner last year too!
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IDEAL Wallpaper Design of the Year 2012 – (Finalist) SDC International Design Competition 2012 – North of England (Runner Up) Zizzi’s Fresh Talent 2012 – Winner http://www.zizzi.co.uk/menucompetition PRINT ODYSSEY 2012 – Invited exhibitor @ Print Odyssey 2012 http://printodyssey-
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WORSHIPFUL COMPANY OF DYERS AWARD (Fashion) 2nd, 3rd Prizes and 4 commendations. • PRESTIGIOUS TEXTILES AWARD (Interiors)2nd, 3rd Prizes and 2 commendations. CLOTHWORKERS' FOUNDATION AWARD (Fashion) 1st prize and 2 commendations CLOTHWORKERS' FOUNDATION AWARD (Interiors)3rd Prize and Commendation
2012.blogspot.co.uk/p/about.html
Tigerprint Studio Competition – 2 winners BETA – 4 Winners
http://betafashion.com/competitionratedesign.aspx?SubmissionID=4781&compID=43&filter= 1
http://www.betafashion.com/competitionratedesign.aspx?SubmissionID=5598 http://www.betafashion.com/competitionratedesign.aspx?SubmissionID=5487 http://www.betafashion.com/competitionratedesign.aspx?SubmissionID=5375
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CAMAC Design Competitions o Graham & Brown – Winner o Timorous Beasties – Winner o Anstey – Winner o Pugin Society – Winner o Wallpaper History Society -‐ Winner
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Muraspec Wallpaper Company – Live Brief winner
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New Designers 2012
An annual exhibition held in London for graduating students to showcase their skills and seek employment. Again we had a fab year with lots of the gang securing employment, internships and commissions for work. We also continued in our rich vein of winning prizes there, following up on 2011’s New Designer of the Year Award with these two much coveted awards:
o Tigerprint Award – Winner (Kathryn Fowler) - £500 plus 6 months paid internship – We have won this prize 2 years in a row now! http://www.newdesigners.com/page.cfm/link=121 o Harlequin Award – Winner - £1000 plus placement http://www.newdesigners.com/page.cfm/link=231
Visiting Professionals, Events & Collaborations Our studio may be a stimulating place to labour with vision, but ultimately means nothing if we are not ready for the outside world. Being ready for to get out there and take the world by storm. Looking to external contexts, employment, global concerns and developing a design practice beyond our studio, the perceptions towards design and aesthetic concern, for clients demands from us that we, recognise, engage and interpret these concerns . Our practice actively is involved with visiting professionals and collaborations (live briefs) to produce the creation of beautiful, versatile and considered works. Collaboration with industry, international tours, design competitions and work placements all contribute to an appreciation of design application and realisations. Recent speakers have included the winners of New Designer of the Year Louise Tiler and Abigail Borg, Wallpaper Designer/Makers Deborah Bowness, Rachel Kelly and Sarah Milton, Internationally celebrated author and curator Mary Schoesser, as well as artist/makers Patrick Hartley (designer for Lady Gaga) and Tabitha Moses.
New Designers, a showcase for emergent graduating designers held in London each year, provides us an opportunity each year to present to the professional design community, the breadth of quality, invention and creativity we have developed over the duration of our degree period.
Indigo Selling globally, across countries as diverse as Brazil, Japan, South Korea, Germany, France,
Italy and the U.S. amongst others, every year we go to one of the world’s premier trade fairs for textile design, fashion fabrics and trends. We identify the forthcoming season’s key trends, colours and looks and then interpret these within our own design responses to produce exciting, styled and fresh solutions for the fashion and accessories market to a number of high profile fashion houses and textile organisations. Companies we have recently sold to include the likes of Lacroix, Louis Vuitton, Custo Barcelona, Heritory, Alexander Henry Fabrics and Desigual amongst others.
Worthless & Priceless & Artists Book Fairs
Our annual worthless or priceless exhibition celebrates values of sustainability, ecology, up-‐
cycling, deconstruction and re-‐invention. It’s about exploring our immediate world to identify artefacts that are intrinsically deemed ‘worthless’ and through manipulation, engineering and practical workshops we like to resurrect these found objects, like a phoenix from the ashes, to produce innovative solutions and products that can be heralded as ‘priceless’, something to cherish and treasure. Similarly, our participation annually at Artists book fairs offers us the chance to work with ‘slow crafting’ to produce items and ideas that champion ‘hand over machine’. Whilst we work extremely hard here, now and again we like to slow things down a touch, to engage with respect and appreciation the process, tradition and quality of craft. This philosophy and celebration of quality, beauty and excellence over the aversion of the mundane permeates then throughout the rest of the programme.
Golden Pen Awards Aesthetic concerns matter to us greatly, as equally does the value we place on theory and
academic rigour. Our approaches to design are based on championing the wonderful relationships between theory and practice. Providing a synthesis of both these values, annually we rejoice in our achievements in this respect with our annual Golden Pen awards. These awards, held internally, seek to promote and celebrate our more serious academic endeavours.
Employers/Internships Supported and underpinned by our excellent understanding of technical skills, design
principles and work attitudes we also like to get stuck in to ‘real’ world proper. To that end, in addition to our events, live briefs and collaborations, all of which simulate life outside our studios, we actively seek placements and internships. This years as graduates we have undertaken a number of placements with the likes of Jonathan Saunders, Mirjam Rouden, Muraspec, Designers Guild, Specialised Covers, Amanda Kelly, Lemon Ribbon, Thornback & Peel, Tigerprint, Pyramid Arts, Duchamp, Home & Garden, Suzy Hoodless, Bombay Duck, Blush Interiors, Zandra Rhodes, First XI, Owens & Kim, Deborah Bowness, Print & Pattern, Rob Ryan, Tatler, Global Colour, Pod Interiors, Lauren McCalmont, Pattern Studios, George @ Asda, Circle Line, White Stuff, Alexander McQueen, Vogue, Paper & Cloth, Liberty’s, Drawn in Light, Ink & Spindle, Foxlinton, Olivia Rubin, Mary Katrantzou, Fromental, Graham & Brown, Holly Fulton, Monsoon, Joules, Next, Keeler Gordon, Turner Bianca, Sparkk, Soochichacha, amongst others..... From Nikki Barker at Zizzi’s “ We work with pre & Post graduate artists. Hannah’s work was of a very high standard, and was more thought through than some of our qualified artists” From Emma Shipley at Thornback and Peel “ Charlotte Mason was a fantastic intern. She was always eager to help. Her work was accurate and neat (which is vital here!) She was a pleasure to have around the studio and we would welcome her back at any time.”
From Helen Truran at Jonathan Saunders “ Hannah worked mainly on Mens AW13 and Prefall 13 development, experimenting with design ideas in Photoshop and Illustrator to work towards woven, knit and print designs. Under constantly changing briefs and ideas she showed great computer skills and work ethic. From Edward Weale at Lemon Ribbon “ The work undertaken by Emma included designing a number of projects, as well as helping us prepare for the show through pre-‐show marketing and stand preparation. She also conducted detailed trend and shop reports for us on High End London and High street shops. We took her to client appointments and she assisted us in preparing the collection to view as well as dealing with any feedback from the clients. As a whole experience, Emma would have seen a great insight into the workings of a design studio around the launch of a seasonal collection. She saw how trends are developed for and interpreted by designers all the way through to seeing clients reactions to those designs.” From Yvonne Chan at Olivia Rubin “ Natalie has been very helpful during her time with us, she was a great help assisting for Lfwend, before and after the event and was especially helpful and professional during the event in September. It was a pleasure having Natalie to assist us through September. Natalie is very polite and professional in her approach to work.”` From Lindsey Weir at Mary Katrantzou “ Hannah was able to be part of the print technical team for a collaborative project with current Elliott and also for the initial print development.”
Graduate Success Profile The majority of our graduates are employed in design teams or studios in the wide range of industries our subject covers and others establish their own practice as designers/ makers. Whatever the individual chooses, our world of design is rich, exciting and fluid. It is forward thinking yet rooted in history and will always embrace innovation, new ideas and vision.
Looking at our success, employment, accolades and commitment to our discipline, hopefully you appreciate that we’re not just good at what we do, we like to think that perhaps you’ll agree with us and recognise that perhaps we’re just a little bit special too. With 92.7% of our cohort in related employment or education within six months*, we invite you to come take a look and find out why we’re just what you’re looking for. *DHLE stats 2013