An update on life!

Hi everyone!

Sorry it's been a while since I last blogged, I've been kinda snowed under with completing my degree!

My work has been submitted, I can't add anything else, and now is just a waiting game until results time!!

I stupidly thought the stress and hard work would be over once I had put my exhibition up and handed all my work in, but myself and some of my classmates are exhibiting in London at New Designers at the end of June and there is a whole bunch of stuff to prepare for that too. The things I have to do for that will also prepare me for my career as a self employed designer though so it's worth putting the time in. I'm getting my products photographed, building a website, creating business cards and presspacks, registering for graduate competitions - the list of work is endless!

 I can't wait to show you images of the mugs, cushions, business cards, etc but for the moment you will have to wait, but watch this space!

Stress!

Ok so I have 1 and a half weeks until I set up my work in my university degree show. 


That means I have 1 and a half weeks to finish making cushions, sew a wall hanging, transfer my patterns to mugs, mount work on design sheets...
To add to my work load I'm also in the process of creating a website, and soon I will need to design and order business cards and other promotional material. 


It's an exciting time but it's also very stressful. 
Unfortunately for my friends and family when I'm stressed I SNAP!!!
It seems to be the closer you are to me the more you feel my bite! My poor old Dad is used to my moody behaviour and deals with it by laughing at me or giving me great fatherly advice. My Mum tends to just ignore me. Both of my parents techniques work great!
My poor son Ollie does not escape my moodiness, God bless him! I do hate snapping at him so in between snaps I tend to say "I'm stressed and snappy so I'm sorry but I can't help it". He has grown up with this side of me so he just says "yes I know" and stays away from me. Welcome to Mary's School of Perfect Parenting - pah!
Now, the newest recipient of my bite is my boyfriend Joe. He has a very different method of dealing with me... He finds it very amusing to try his best to wind me up even more! He winds me, and winds me, until I'm like a coiled spring! I yell my head off and call him all the names under the sun! But in a bizarre twist, because Joe is laughing and joking it does lighten the situation, it gets my tension out quicker, and a happier Mary returns faster.


Because I'm so very busy my friends have not received the snappy end of my stick over this period... YET! But unfortunately I have had little to no time for them, they're getting neglected and I'm missing them! But I will definitely make up for this once deadlines have past!

Opinions please!

I'd really appreciate your help! 

I'd love your opinion, I've designed some fabric for cushions and I'd like to know which colourway you prefer out of the examples below? Pretty please leave a comment at the bottom of this blog post to let me know your favourite. In a few weeks you might see images on my blog of your choice of colour printed up on silk fabric!

Beige

Gray

Lilac

Pink

Teal

What I got up to on my Easter break...

Today I was back at uni after a 2 week break for Easter. However, there was no rest for the wicked! I managed to secure a 2 week work placement in the homeware design team at Matalan head office in Skelmersdale. It's about an hours drive from my home to Skelmersdale so for the first week I booked into a cheap hotel. I did start to wonder whether the work experience was worth it when I arrived at the hotel to discover a black & white TV in my room and no wi-fi! But after completing the 2 weeks I can honestly say it's the most valuable thing I've done with regards to my career. I learnt so much about the job I hope to do after graduation. It also reassured me that I am trained and very capable of a career in design! The thought of the unknown before these 2 weeks had me seriously doubting!

I arrived at a time in their schedule when they were deciding and finalising the colours for each trend for Spring/Summer 2013, and briefing the buying team on the trends for that season so they know what to buy when they go out to the suppliers in the Far East. It was exciting to see all their inspiration and learn their process for building the trends. 

All the staff in the homeware design team made me feel so welcome, they included me in everything they were doing, gave time to teach me things and never gave me dogs-body jobs or made me feel like a burden.

I don't think I'd be allowed to show you the trends for next year but these are some of the designs I did inspired by their trends.

Firstly I drew some sketched, then from those I produced these images in illustrator

I then used these images in cushion designs

Then I produced these mug designs for each theme

Tiles and Piles!

Hello again!

Gosh it's been a while since I blogged last! Last time I told you I had plans to do a shoe, and a kitchen theme as well as my existing dog and jumble themes. So here's what has been produced!

To begin with I arranged the kitchen utensils I drew into a similar pattern that I did with the dog and jumble drawings.

I wanted to create a different sort of pattern to create more interest in my range so I layered my drawings and arranged them in a more random way

With my shoe drawings, again I firstly arranged them in quite a uniform pattern

I also arranged them in this uniform pattern, I quite like the way these shoes look like butterflies!

I think they look even more like butterflies in this layout

I have designed a braver and more contempory pattern for the shoes which is this big pile. The shoes are all different sizes so it is less literal and more surrealist.

Here it is in a room setting to give you an idea of size

I've just started working on a very different style of pattern compared to what I have been doing which is this tile effect

As always, let me know what you think!

Queen's Jubilee Scarf Competition

Today I've been distracted from my current project. I've been designing a scarf for a competition run by Selvedge Magazine, it needs to be to commemorate the Queen's Jubilee but also influenced by your time at on your course studying textiles. It needed to be 50cm x 50cm and have a border or edging.

Anybody who knows me in real life or virtually, even if you've only read my blog once, will know how much my dogs mean to me. At the beginning of this final year at university our tutor gave us a talk telling us the importance of taking a break from our heavy load a work to do the usual hobbies or things we do, saying that it will help us clear mental blocks, and give us thinking time. For me that hobby is my dogs. Spending time with them is like therapy! The Queen's Corgi dogs are iconic and I thought maybe the Queen and I have our dogs in common! So I did some pencil sketches of Corgi dogs...

I wanted to give it quite a traditional look so it would stand the test of time and luckily that fits in with the kitch sort of style that I like. To keep with that traditional and kitch theme I stuck with the red, white and blue colour palette, and created a simple striped border. I also gave the dogs a blue wash of colour. This was my first attempt at combining the border and the dog drawings...

I felt like the dogs arrangement was too uniform so I played with the size and scale of the dogs producing this design...

Remembering that the scarf was 50cm x 50cm I thought the dogs were a bit too large, so I came up with my final design which I think will be the entry I submit...

Do you agree that this should be my choosen design? Would you buy my scarf?!

Just a quick one today!

Just a quick one today!

Another little update of work on my current collection. I've started to find some styles and patterns that I really like within my work now so I've put one into a room setting here to see what it would look like.

What do you think?

This is quite traditional, chintzy room decor which I like and I think this wallpaper would suit. Although I can see it in a clean, very modern room setting too.

If you look on my previous blog post you'll see I have this dog theme, and a "jumble" theme of scissors, dog collars, and glasses. I'm working on two other themes to compliment these which are shoes, and kitchen.

Here are some of my sketches from the kitchen theme as a taste of what's to come.

Progress?

Hello again! Here's a little update on the design work I'm doing at the moment. Have a peek at previous posts to see what I've done before this. 

The patterns below are some of my favorite so far, I can see where they're heading now.

I've used the drawings of my dogs to create a more random pattern. This pattern below is a working repeat.

 Here's how it works when it is repeated.

I've done the same with the objects from my home that I drew. I like the tonal changes in colour, rather than making them grayscale and all the objects having the same tones.

 And here's how this one works as a repeat. I think I need to work on this one more so the repeat is not so obvious.

 I also used the hand drawn objects to create this busy random repeat pattern. I can see this on a thin, sheer fabric such as silk. 

Here I combined the objects with the dog lead pattern I created. I really like this, even as a stand alone piece.

This is the same as the pattern above but in a red and black colourway.

And here it is in a red and blue colourway.

I've made the above pattern into a repeating pattern. I like the busy-ness of it.

I've made the pattern a bit less busy here by using the red objects on their own in the middle of the pattern.

Here it is when it is repeated. I think it needs more work to make it look more continuous.

I originally started designing  for interior fabrics and wallpapers but now the patterns are developing I can see some of the simple black and white patterns on tiles. And some of the random repeats as gift wrap. 

As always, let me know what you think!!

BRING ON SUMMER!

So last week I booked my ticket for Kendal Calling. Kendal Calling is a music festival which has grown from very small beginnings in my home town of Kendal, year on year it's got bigger and booked more impressive acts, and now it's held in Lowther Park which is near Penrith, about 30 mins from Kendal.

Unbeknownst to me, and to each other, my two bezzy mates Amy and Becca had also booked their tickets on that same morning last week - total excitement!

This is the three of us on my birthday night out in Chester last year (me, Becca, Amy)

I have been to V Festival quite a few times, once with Becca which was 2 years ago. 

(Me and Becca at V Festival)

My original partner in crime for V Festival is my very best friend who I've grown up with since we were 3, Lucy. She is THE best moshing partner ever! The only time I've been without her is when I went with Becca, Lucy had a bun in the oven!

(My fave pic of Lucy and I in our lion & monkey hats at V)

I've also been to Kendal Calling the last 4 years. For two of those years I took my son Ollie. We had the most fun time ever, he was like a little celebrity, with strangers asking him for high 5's and to have their photos taken with him! But going with a child means you can't drink! 

(Ollie raving it up in Kiss makeup, with a group of my friends)

But the three of us, myself, Becca and Amy, have never had the festival experience together. I can't wait to go with these two girls because we always have the best times together. We're so comfortable in each others company and know each other inside out so I'm 100% sure the banter will flow all weekend and it will be full on fun!

Not to mention the amazing live music we'll be jumping around to! This year I'm really looking forward to seeing Feeder, Dizzee Rascal, and Shed Seven, and then raving until the early hours in the hot and sweaty Glow Tent. We also get to see someone we know in actual real life perform this year! Amy's lovely house mate Jim will be on stage as Bad Bad Me, he has the most amazing voice to make your knees wobble so make sure you don't miss him if you're going!

BRING ON SUMMER!

Kendal Calling's website is http://www.kendalcalling.co.uk/

"In My House..."

Sometimes I feel like I'm making loads of progress with my current design project, then I look at how many weeks I have left until the exhibition and I panic! 

In a previous blog post I showed you my initial ideas of line drawings of things that are important to me, composed in a similar way to tattoo designs. Since then I've decided to call the project "In my house...". So I've been doing lots of drawings of people and things in my house and now I'm at the stage of putting very simple and basic patterns together, these will be further developed into more complex and impressive designs in the next few weeks. These are surface pattern designs to be used on fabrics and wallpapers for interiors.

You've already seen my "doggy" composition and here is a composition I call "jumble". It's a collection of line drawings of my glasses, dog collars, and scissors.

I did some more drawings of my dogs, this time with their bodies, not just their heads! Here is a little repeat pattern I made up with them.

Here is a pattern I've created with many different drawings of dog leads, it reminds me of worms!

I combined the dog leads and the dogs to make this repeat pattern

I've used a photograph of my carpet to create a textured background, here is an enlarged section of this pattern

Let me know what you think so far!

A wish list as long as my arm!

I'm sure of you have been there - I'm a student and I'm skint!
I spend a lot of my time daydreaming about things I want to buy, I'm going to try and get it out of my system by showing you a few of the gorgeous items I'd buy if I could...


BooBoo Kitty Couture has some of the most gorgeous clothes, they're handmade to your measurements, the fabric prints are really exciting, and you wouldn't find such original buys on the high street. There's several items on her etsy store I'd love but this is my favourite dress and my favourite bandana

Visit here Etsy store at http://www.etsy.com/shop/boobookittycouture

If you don't already own a Rockalily London lippy YOU SHOULD! I only have one, in Pompodour Pink but it is my absolute fave. It smells good, glides on easily, comes in cool packaging, and most importantly it lasts for hours. The next shades on my list are Rockette Red and ZOMG!

Take a look at the lippys (and her interesting blog!) at http://www.rockalily.com/

I am a speccy-4-eyes, but I love my glasses as an accessory. There is a lot of vintage, and vintage-style frames I have on my mental shopping list but here are two pairs from http://www.deadmensspex.com/default/ that I really love.

The shape of these black ones are awesome

This pretty green colour is lush

Now wish me luck in finding a fancy graduate job so I can start buying!