A Tribute to the King of Fashion, Alexander McQueen

Okay, lets take a little time to admire the pure artistry of Alexander McQueen's creations. I've recently been working on a design project inspired by Alice and wonderland, and so unsurprisingly I looked into Avante Garde designers such as McQueen and Vivienne Westwood for inspiration, but I had time to properly delve into some of McQueen's earlier collections- particularly Spring/Summer 2007 and discovered a much overdue admiration for his work! McQueen epitomised Fashion as an art form, bringing such a spectacular amount of imagination to his work, teamed with an astoundingly high level of craftsmanship and this is why I think he's one of the most talented fashion designers of all time.
Here are a few of my personal favourites... (Cue "oooh"s and "aaahh"s)
S x


 

Through the Looking Glass photo shoot!

I’ve just completed my final major project of my foundation course and here are a few snaps from my fashion shoot! My chosen theme was ‘Through the looking glass’ inspired loosely on Alice in wonderland, so its got that theatrical, fairy-tale-ish aspect to it. The finished outfit consists of a semi-fitted bodice with an embellished shoulder piece, and a skirt made up of black and gold layered netting to create a tutu effect.

My lovely model, Emma, was perfect for the garment, I think the red hair really compliments the clothes and adds that extra drama.
It was such a fun project to end the course on!

CREATIVE not clinical!

Why is it that as creative people we can get so clinical and lose our flair and passion? I’ve recently just finished a foundation course, specialising in fashion and at some stages of it I found myself working in a very clinical way, just following the set briefs but not putting myself into it, and it made doing the work actually fairly boring I’ve got to say. I was paying too much attention to ‘rules’ and ‘am I doing this right?’ and going about everything systematically… and so it meant my work wasn’t the best it could be, it wasn’t expressive enough, and it sucked!

Creative and clinical are words that don’t mesh together at all. So chuck the rule-books out of the window, stop comparing your work to others’ (why try and make it like somebody else’s, no-one wants a copy!)but instead channel any thoughts, ideas and inspiration into your work, that way you’re being expressive and creating something that you’re passionate about.

Sophie
    x

PS. ( This may seem a little contradictory to what I’ve just said but here are some ‘rules’ for staying creative!!)

Vital life lessons in patience and perseverence

So I guess I’m a bit of a perfectionist, I have firm ideas of what I want to do, where I want to go and what I want to achieve in life. And the problem with that is that sometimes I don’t make room for other possibilities, things that may work out just as well as I thought my ‘ideals’ would. And so when things don’t go as I’d hoped, I tend to let myself sink into a pit, and think that there is no other way, but this is such an unhealthy and unnecessary way of thinking, as I’ve come to understand now.

For all we know, that ‘perfect ideal’ we had in our minds could have actually just been a second or third best, not what’s actually best for us as individuals. So why should we settle for something that’s not the best for us?  I’m going to make a really cheesy analogy here now, so bear with me, but I just want to demonstrate a point…. think of a map, there is always more than one route to get to your destination right? some may be quicker, others may take a bit longer and seem a bit more hard going, some a bit windy and unsure, you may stop sometimes and get a bit lost, but they all take you to the same place, you end up where you want to be. So maybe it doesn’t matter if we take a different route than originally planned, as that route will turn out to be the best one for us.

So my lessons (to myself, and to anyone else who can relate) are to be open minded to new routes in life, to not freak out when I don’t quite know where I’m going, but to persevere and have a bit of patience.

Sophie
    x