Olivia Gao

Friday, February 28, 2014

Research Theme

My Research Theme is "Gender"

I want to research more about

"What happens if traditional stereotype Masculine and Feminine are revised?"

Jean Paul Gaultier Exhibition Tour

I really enjoyed the "The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier: From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk" exhibition.

The Fashion World of Jean Paul Gaultier: From the Sidewalk to the Catwalk

In the exhibition, I realized how exquisite the designer's work was. Every pieces was cared by little tiny details, there were no flaws anywhere. I could see the designer not only spent a lot of time on those dresses, but also the methods to exhibit. Like the decoration in every room, the careful choses of fabric on the wall, the lighting colors and the interior design of emotions; the singing models which were so surprising and awesome, and the way they standing to show the garments were so confident. For me, I felt every exhibit room gave me different visual feeling, which really matches the main idea of different collections.

I admire how bold Jean Paul Gaultier is. When I was walking through every collection section, I saw what others did not dare to design in that time period, even for now. Those unique combination of forms and fabric not just a revolution at that time, it's still a revolution in nowadays fashion industry.

I found different "revolutions" were divided in different section, for me I would explain sections as "Women's power","every girl can be fashionable"( in the exhibition there were few oversize models were wearing fantastic dresses) "neutral" "sexual"(sexy corsets) and "high-class world".

I like how he expresses himself in his designs, also expresses many kinds of human type in collections. For example, he designed suits for women, also evening dress with pants, perfectly showed women's power.Also, he designed lace clothes and dresses for men which satisfied some men's dream. I think, he is not only designs fashion, his designs are more about culture. He showed people's secrets and thoughts boldly in his design.

From Jean Paul Gaultier's interview online, I found his inspirations were from his life, like the people around him, natural around hime and culture around him. I can see that from his designs, that is so obvious, because every collection seems like a story behind it, a culture behind it. Not every collections seems all about beauty and fashion, some of them are not so pretty but the theme of that collection is very interesting.

For me, most of my inspirations are from life also. However, I think sometimes I consider too much about beauty, and forget the original reason why I choose the theme. Really learnt a lot from Jean Paul Gaultier's exhibition.

Friday, February 21, 2014

Final Fabric Manipulations

Inspiration Museum Label

Black Evil in Red Blooming Rose

A died red rose?

No.

It’s the blooming black rose.

Full of vigor.

Description:

My concept for this collection is a Drying Rose process.

From bottom to top(photo attached):

1.The blooming rose
2.Through layers and layers

3.she's drying and she lowers her head with shy face

4. The Pain messed up inside her body

（this fabric has two parts）

Left part：cannot stand

right part：calming down

5. The rose became less rage of blooming because of stale.

The arranged petals and clear layers were caused by drying process.

6. The nerves stopped beating in rose, withering together.

Reflection:

I love this experience of making fabric manipulations, I had so much fun. I love each pieces that I made, because each of them was made by different techniques.

It is really hard to choose the favorite one, I love the uniqueness of each of them. However, I would say the third one from the bottom is most successful one, the reason is that, this piece is very elegant in a clean way, also it gives a feeling of drying rose with emotion on it.

I think this collection really shows my concept of beauty: unpredictable. I would not have known that I will make a collection like this until I finished everything. This result came out with lots of experiences. I did not make an exact rule for my fabric shape, I just had a feeling in my mind, like what kind of feeling this fabric will express, then I tried to make it. Actually, I tried to sketch a pattern for my fabric manipulation once. I tried to make an exactly same fabric. But, in the half of that process, I found it was more beautiful just kept the fabric in that unfinished shape.I like the surprise while creating stuff, it is even more exciting than getting inspirations. After that experience, I learnt that the feeling of the fabrics were more important, sometimes to make a rule for design really restrict ideas to pop up. Thus, this collection are made with unpredictable, and I love it.

Sunday, February 16, 2014

Fashion Blog

Fashion blog

http://www.thesartorialist.com/

This is an awesome fashion blog, which provides latest fashion show information and great " on the street" fashion style photos. Really great website to get inspiration from.

Also this blog has different sections like"Women","men","style profile" and etc. Very clearly to view and useful for everyone.

Saturday, February 15, 2014

Beauty of Fabric Manipulation

My definition of beauty is about "unpredictable" and "possibility"

I think from this experience of making fabric manipulation, I found beauty is really about those two words.

Because all my fabric manipulation pieces were ended in the result which I didn't expect, and I LOVE how the results turned out.

I love to create in more unkown way, not the way like "It has to be end like this." It is not about figuring out Math problems, it is about surprise.

This two pieces below is more about test and try.

For the first one I tried to fold fabric together to give more 3D effect. Because I really like structured items.

All-Sides Gathering

For This one below, I tried to cut holes to let fabric can go through into the other piece of fabric. I think this is an interesting way to connect fabric pieces together.

This one I was inspired by "Slashed Tucks"

Also, I was inspired by my beauty item, the "sunrise" one. I wanted to show the layers and layers, steps by steps of "sunrise".

I like this technique, because it can add pretty texture on a simple fabric.

Details

This sample I was inspired by the beauty of "Rose"

After I searched "Pattern Shirring" online, I felt I could make a bigger "Pattern Shirring" and gather them together. It may gave a really interesting result.

It ended very well, I was imaging this pattern could on a beautiful big dress, it must be very romantic.

Details

At the bottom of this pattern, I cut a hole on one piece of fabric

I wanted other two pieces can be connected by using this hole.

Go through it and stay in the hole because of the tightness of the hole.

For this piece, I was inspired my beauty item "ice cube"

I was wondering if I could sew some ice cube on a 3D fabric.

I sew two layers of fabric all together but one side, then put tissue paper through that side, at the end, I sew all sides together.

But when I tried to sew "ice cubes" on the puffy fabric, my sew machine stuck a lot. And when I tried to sew the bottom edge together, my machine didn't work. So, I finished at handed-sewing. I like how the fabric stretched against each other.