Fashion Design Catalogue 2023

Degree Show Catalogue

Introduction from Professor Stephen Bottomley, Head of the School of Design

Welcome to the 2023 School of Design Degree Show at the Glasgow School of Art.

In your hands is one of a dozen graduating catalogues that have been lovingly assembled for each of our exhibiting programmes in the School of Design for their shows this year. Within these sheets you will discover the exciting work of our graduating students in image and text, alongside reflective snap shots that capture the energy, and concentration within our studios in the run up to this exhibition.

We believe making a physical catalogue to accompany our excellent digital on-line showcases is both important and relevant. Research has revealed what we intuitively knew, that making, and art is good for our mental health and can positively improve the quality of life by alleviating symptoms of anxiety, depression, loneliness and even dementia. In our busy lives, we all spend an increasing amount of time in digital environments, yet we remain alert to the important of reinforcing a balance between the virtual and the real in our teaching and specialist practices.

In the 1850s the Glasgow Government School of Design changed its name to The Glasgow School of Art, while in the same time John Ruskin, the most influential critic of the Victorian era, spoke of an education where the ‘hand, the head and the heart’ were interconnected. As you will witness, those values are still very much alive and true today.

We hope that this guide accompanies you on your journey be it at our Glasgow degree show, or at later events in London and that the work reflects the passion and attention of our students, as well as the care of the staff who have guided them.

To all our graduating students on behalf of all the staff, academic, administrative and support, we wish you every success in this, the exciting start of your careers. Please continue to stay in touch with us, remembering us in your hearts and minds, as we will you.

Professor Stephen Bottomley

MPhil RCA, MA Design, BA Hons Head of the School of Design

Design History and Theory

Nicholas Oddy Head of Department of Design History and Theory

As part of their degree, all BA Hons School of Design students submit a substantial piece of written work to the Department of Design History and Theory (DH&T) and a synopsis of every one is included in these pages. Students may opt for either a shorter (5,000 word) or longer (10,000 word) submission, the latter being a third of their overall degree submissions. In addition to the two lengths, there are three different modes of submission; essay/dissertation; critical journal (exploring the author’s studio practice in a larger critical and cultural context); or curatorial rationale (an in-depth proposal for an exhibition with its subject and venue the choice of the author). All DH&T staff are involved in the supervision of Honours submissions, which is on a one-to-one basis, and it is always a pleasure to guide what is always a wide range of fascinating and challenging projects.

DH&T is independent of studio, with its own external examiner, and upholds a principle of free subject choice. Therefore, while some write on topics directly concerned with their studio practice, others explore topics that seem to have no bearing on it, often personal interests or socio-cultural issues. This does not mean they are unconnected with studio, however, as the creative process is one of thought and all these submissions are deeply thoughtful, often informing practice in intangible, but significant ways.

Finally, congratulations to everyone who has submitted this year. On behalf of all in the Department, good luck in whatever the future holds.

Fashion Design

Julia Maclean-Evans Programme Leader

I am delighted to invite you to view the work of the students of the BA (Hons) Fashion Design programme at the Glasgow School of Art and to celebrate their achievements in a physical Degree Show in the School of Design’s Reid building.

A core focus of the programme is to create highly specialist graduates in an ‘expert amongst experts’ environment which values the interactive, synergistic and ever evolving nature of Fashion Design. The diversity of projects on display in the following pages are evidence that our students embrace this philosophy.

As an industry with a focus on physical products, we are conscious of the impact fashion has on the environment and society. Our students actively engage in responsible design practices, considering what is important to them and how they can initiate positive change. This might be through but not limited to, circular practices, promoting equality and wellbeing, or using traditional and digital technologies that are more sustainable. As our students move forward into practice, employment or postgraduate study they will take with them the value of designing responsibly.

The team wishes the students all the very best and ask you to keep in touch!

Charles Stewart Dora Kapus Eleanor Clappison Smith Eve Gardiner

‘I Am All of These, Not One of These. Some I Like, Some Loathe’ is the emancipation of the Modern Man. There is a focus on mental health, the history of masculinity, and with the influence of modern fashion, have been led to my discovery of the make-up of men. started this year in a personal crisis and capitalised on the questions asked myself through a time of struggle, it is a deeply personal project that features a concept journal under the same name. I have expanded upon the emotions and beliefs within myself, and with reference to texts such as ‘Masculinity in Crisis’ by Roger Horrocks, I have documented the changes that masculinity has undergone to present day, and what’s to come. The silhouettes, colours, and fibres within the collection have been decided by an imposter, one who has found the man in himself by the end of this creative journey. have discovered that embracing Vulnerability, Femininity, Aggression and Acceptance can have a positive impact on the modern male psyche.

As the world has gone through many important changes over the last 70 years, it seems that the one thing that has stood still is masculinity.

In my third year I was interested in the questions “what is it that really makes me the person I am?”, and “what are the objects/memories/places that have over time formed my identity?”. It was during this project that I realised that the place where I felt most at home and ultimately most myself was in my grandmother’s house, and I really wanted to transfer this feeling into clothing. She hasn’t thrown away anything since probably the 1960s, and her house is somewhat of a time capsule filled with objects from Socialist Hungary to today.

My graduate collection is an extension of this project, but instead of ‘recreating’ the aura of my grandma’s house through garments, it focuses instead on creating a world of my own by combining objects have found at her house with elements from 1960s Hungary including traditional Hungarian dress and culture.

Aside from being an attempt to preserve all the things love before they are ultimately lost, my collection also transforms the grief feel in connection to my country, and where it is at the moment, creating an imaginary world of what Hungary once was, or perhaps could have been.

‘The Ferns Conceived on the Giants Bed’ is a knitwear collection in celebration of Celtic folklore, festival and traditional British craft. Pagan rituals and sabbats informed my line-up, taking inspiration from the cycle of seasons, colour and texture in relation to each celebration.

I dyed the entire collection with the ancient method of natural dying to create a colour palette, using foraged and grown dye material native to British soil, most of which I collected myself on walks around Glasgow. The collection is primarily knitwear, consisting of techniques and fashioning methods developed to create shape and fluidity in my garments. Inspiration from traditional and medieval clothing informed my silhouettes and shapes within the knitted garments, whilst sacred standing stones circles informed my sewn undergarments.

These were sewn using simple zero waste pattern cutting methods drafted in natural fibres, and eco printed on the surface with the organically formed patterns of oak leaves. Sustainability is very important in my practice, so all yarn used had been donated from Barrie Knitwear and Todd and Duncan, and the fabrics either donated or ethically sourced. Thank you to Megan Vischer for the jewellery collection styled with my line-up.

ERCS – Eleanor Rosa Clappison Smith xxx

I will invest in my community.

I will be honest.

I will practice an ‘As Found’ approach.

I will transform.

I will limit production.

I will practice a zero-waste approach.

I will ensure accessibility.

I will reject gender.

I will practice design for disassembly.

I will reject functionality.

I will celebrate Scottish talent.

I will reject classism.

I will make a social statement.

I will create the ‘Avant Garde’. I will provoke change.

GLASGOW IS FASHION.

Within my practise as a fashion designer, focus on exploring Scottish heritage alongside sustainable initiatives. Throughout history highland wear has been reinvented to appeal to the newer generations. By combining aspects of this traditional wear with classic tailoring found in 1950s Glasgow, I developed a contemporary menswear collection for my graduate project ‘Interwoven Alba’. I design with the people in mind, ensuring the garments are long lasting through good wearability, adjustable fits, and enduring fabrics. Tackling textile industry waste, I upcycled donated knit offcuts from local textile manufacturers in Scotland, using them to design my own tartan. Surplus waxed cotton, its finish made of melted postconsumer plastics, makes up the majority of my garments. Being aware of and investing in the manufacturers and businesses working toward a sustainable future is a motive am keen to further explore as I progress within the fashion industry. Subsequently, my dissertation is a more personal deep dive into Scottish culture and its textile history. discover how interconnected my work is with regard to my experiences living in Scotland and explore the idea of merging the past with the present to design for a sustainable future.

My practice has come a long way. The labour of love that I have put into it clearly shows in comparison to previous years. My degree project explores comfort and glamour by creating ballgown silhouettes with sportswear details and leisurewear fabrics. was inspired by the journey of reconnecting to my childhood self, through play, princesses and physical freedom. I mainly worked with stretch fabrics like jersey, and lycra, adding a touch of shiny taffeta here and there. I explored waistband construction, triple necklines and cover stitching amongst other techniques. In total I have produced five garments. was my own muse, to meet my need for a marriage between comfort and style.

The 20-credit project that created is personal from a very different angle. It is about my grandmother and her Alzheimer’s. It was a collaboration between GSA and the Young Academy of Scotland.

My collection follows the storyline of a messy night out in Liverpool from the getting ready to the repercussions the next day.

I focus on the word ‘Bimbo’ which is derogatory slang defining a conventionally attractive, sexualised, naïve and unintelligent woman. I use hyper-masculine biker gang aesthetics such as leather, hard-ware and ass-less chaps, with exaggerated silhouettes within vintage motorbikes to subvert the meaning of Bimbo, iconising powerful women.

The focus on the word ‘Bimbo’ takes inspiration from superficial personas such as Paris Hilton, whose media-persona find so alien but fascinating. She allows herself to be perceived as a ‘dumb blonde’ but in fact has a genius IQ. Music has a huge impact throughout my creative practice, I look to powerful women such as Zumi Rosow, Madonna and Poison Ivy as muses for my collection.

Clad from head to toe in bitch pink, leather and PVC, these chaotic girls are called “Bel’s Bimbo Bikers”.

A special thanks to my parents Kath and Andy; Tutors Cavan, Tony and Christie and Technicians Ashleigh, Rachel, Dan and Emily for all your help and continued support.

As someone who is drawn to all things cute alongside narratives and creatures that have a darker aspect to them, realise that there are key interests throughout my life that carry both these elements. My collection combines the creepy and the cute through the subversive marrying of textiles and colour. Inspirations starting from Jan Svankmajer’s film adaption of Alice in Wonderland led me to create collages using images of taxidermy which were fed through an AI system to create unique dolllike creatures. These collages came to inform a myriad of design decisions, from distressed finishings to oversized silhouettes. Whilst wanting to bring back a playful dressing-up element of childhood and using the instinctiveness of layering, aprons became an important feature to the collection. The versatility of aprons played a part in developing shape within the garments, contorting themselves into sleeves, skirts, and trousers that tie into and onto each other. It became clear that there was a link between the colours present in my research, and those found in my personal wardrobe. This led me to revisit my own clothes when making colour and fabric decisions, re-enforcing the link between my research and my personal history. This collection has evolved from an interrogation to a celebration of the relationship between creepy and cute.

Iona Yost Irinǵo Gemza

Isobel Greslow Lemon Fraser

Lena Pogodina Louise Webber

Thanks to my Estonian background rich in its craft traditions, the process of creating things by hand quite naturally became a core element of my design practice. often look for inspiration in the more traditional forms of craft, such as knitting, weaving or leather work, and explore ways of thoughtfully incorporating them into my fashion creations.

For my final collection I’m using a fabric manipulation technique I invented when working on a sustainability project for a leather design competition. However, this time have explored the idea fully in other materials like wool felt and limestone neoprene that was recycled from old wetsuits. The structures built were combined with knitted fabrics allowing me to create novel and eye-catching silhouettes and textures.

To provide theoretical support for my work, explored how designers can benefit from the craft’s practical vocabulary of making. My written work approached craft as a process, or a way of doing things, rather than as a classification of objects or people, making it possible to analyse the work of a craftsman and a designer from the points of learning and skill, attitudes to function and materials, as well as placing them among their communities.

Glasgow-based designer, with a keen interest in identity and how it can be conveyed emotionally and physically through culture and society. My work this year has been focused on female inheritance of trauma, how myth and folklore can be both informant and informer. Mythology has in every culture, been a means of creating and maintaining sociological expectations. Throughout generations, these stories have been interpreted and reinterpreted according to the cultural and social norms of the period or region, and therefore undisputedly follow long traditions of generational bias. In popularised Classical myth, women became objectified, degraded, ostracised, sexualised, and vilified, all under the justifications of the embellishment of their actions and motives.

My collection will focus on the way femininity is explored though Celtic myth. It is often viewed with a lot more respect and understanding. Its stories feature women who are diverse and empowering, who often relay the same wildness and spirituality observed in nature. Women are not vilified and ostracised for not living up to the standards set by male centric values.

My approach has been to focus on the exploration of texture and form relating to the wild natural aspects that these myths relay. My practice involves the manipulation of fabric through use of smocking, appliqué, ruche and embroidery, among other processes and coatings.

Mannie Rosie Nan Gao

UGGLEY F.C is a small football club located in the town Uggley.

This ugly fashion collection is an amalgamation of personal, social and ecological ugliness. Forming the unlikely comparisons between skin conditions, mould, stalagmites and graffiti in club toilets. Using the feeling of chronically dry, peeling, inflamed skin to inform my textile techniques, silhouette and shoes. Presented to the audience through aesthetically aggressive patterns, colours and knit.

When knitting, the fabric faces away from the maker, creating a lack of control, but also, an opportunity to highlight the ‘other’ side. The back that is not seen, due to its messy, ugly appearance. The word strip has come to have many meanings in this collection, the stripping of skin and the football strip. Sportswear has informed the garment construction and allowed for further experimentation, with different weights and strengths of yarns. Primarily elastic yarns (the brats of the yarn family) which refuse to relinquish control.

However, again allowing for a design process that places the designer in the passenger seat. Whilst constantly problem solving it has created new silhouettes and textures that have broadened this collection beyond initial designs. Altogether this accumulates into a collection that forces the viewer to perceive ‘ugliness’ and consciously rework their own definition.

The research for this collection started with Shanghai, which has been known as the “Eastern Pairs” for the past century. It was the cultural centre of China at the time, containing a diverse range of colliding people, nationalities, and cultures.

I became intrigued by the women of Shanghai who were independent and rebellious. In the mid 1900s Shanghai women gained the right to wear cheongsam. When a group or an individual started to think about cultural confidence, a sense of belonging to the nation started to arise. As for me, cultural confidence is not rejecting or scorn foreign cultures.

I believe my daily clothing choices are an outward expression of my own sense of ‘self’, showing the blurring of my gender and the boundaries of the cultures I associate with. I believe that an individual’s culture does not need to be defined, and I endeavoured to integrate this with my own life experiences.

Within this fashion collection, modern design represents my experience of studying abroad whilst traditional Chinese elements refers to my cultural background. Double fabrics used throughout the garments symbolises the fusion of the two cultures.

Scarlett David-Gray

Scarlett is a womenswear designer who specialises in subversive drape and couture hand-sewing techniques. Their graduate collection, “Kallipyga” (meaning beautiful buttocks in Greek), began with a desire to explore the erotic potential of the body, and soon spiraled into a fervent obsession with the perverse role flesh plays in the relationship between designer, model and garment. Much of the design decisions have been influenced by the work of artist Hans Bellmer, in particular his series Les Jeux de la Poupée (The Games of the Doll) and his personal pornographic illustrations, alongside the designers ecclesiastical experiences in Greek Orthodox churches during pilgrimages to their family in Athens.

The outcome is a collection that is both delicate and demanding. Sharp suiting silhouettes are malformed by their fabric, while heavy, hand-stitched drape drags at the waists of dresses and skirts. There is a notable focus on revealing what is often concealed, with particular reverence given to the stomach and back, and a dedication to objectifying that which is often not allowed to inhabit the traditional erotic sphere.

With enduring thanks to Mathilda O’Neill, Lemon Fraser, Mum and Dad, Sarah McCormack, and Furmaan Ahmed, for donations of your love, patience, knowledge, and (most importantly)… fabric. This collection would not be possible without all of you.

Cover image: Scarlett David-Gray

Studio photography: Shannon Tofts

Design: Kat Loudon and Phoebe Willison

Headline typeface: Rules by Freddie Guthrie

Printed by The Newspaper Club on 55gsm improved newsprint.

All work shown remains the property of the designers and may not be reproduced in print or any other media without written permissions. Contact details for all work is provided on each page for any enquiries.