Due to my lack of organisational skills my camera lead has disappeared under a few layers of work!! So hopefully i'll put up a few more posts later on when the tidying phase begins!! Had a really exciting week full of costumes, textile waste plants, long walks and scientific lectures...I shall expand with pictures soon!!

Just found this really sweet little video about a small community project that took off and had contributions from artists all over the world, giving their interpretations on the oil crisis we face...


 
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=RSAaV-d2s8Y

Yesterday I attended an amazing conference at the V&A hosted by BioLabs, it was a great insight into environmental issues from a more scientific and economical perspective, John Thackara hosted a question and answer session after each group of talks which really gave you an insight into what other designers thought of the tough questions and changes that need to take place in order for our planet to begin to repair and sustain us as humans for a long time to come...





I also went to see Wicked in the evening...It was an amazing stage show and the costumes were so well made and adapted perfectly for the movement needed for the dancers!! The whole set design blew me away and the singers were unbelievably good!!



  

Well a very busy weekend was had by me!! I travelled back up home to Bolton on Friday to do a photo shoot for a new collection of knitwear accessories for Frock Around The Clock...which is going live very soon so i'll keep you posted on that one!! The model and photographer were delightful and amazing as per usual and the weather was surprisingly bright for an Autumn Northern day...the shots have come out great and i've put a few of them below but i'm going to make a full page of them soon (when i've caught up on sleep!!) I also went a great vintage fair at The Met in Manchester, it had some lovely bargains and amazing hand made jewellery so i'll definitely be stopping by on them again next time round!! To top off my day back home we went to see Idlewild in Club Academy and even with their short delay (bus broke down near Preston bless them!!) they wowed everyone and were totally amazing...no El Capitan though but I swooned a lot over their Scottish voices!!

My mum emailed me this great link to the BBC news website, where a woman is trying to make her way across England living on repairing textiles for people and getting them to give her services for hers....

We had a great lecture out in the woods yesterday with Kate Fletcher, it was lovely to know that just a ten minute walk from Belsize Park Tube Station was a little piece of nature (disrupted only a little by an airplane every 15 minutes!) We paired up and one of us was blindfolded whilst the other showed us where to walk and what to touch...it was amazing how many ordinary things felt completely different to how you believed they would...even the silky textures of a leaf were amazing to touch but took a while for my brain to register what it was!! After the lecture we then had a lovely picnic on the bandstand with some amazing handmade cakes!!

On a great trip out with a lovely Geordie we headed to the Natural History Museum to soak up dinosaurs and a lot of nature...here are a couple of pictures from the day which actually gave me a helping hand in researching about ecology and the way we interpret nature...

 

I love the way this display has been curated



We need to remember that everything we do is interlinked with nature



I loved this way of displaying short films



haha what better way to put the message across??



A display rein-acting how chlorophyll cells react and change to sunlight

A big part of my weekend has been taken up with exploring with friends from back home (I loved the excuse to be really touristy for a couple of days and just wander about!!) So heres a whole host of pictures from a very busy couple of days...



I thought this was a great idea for inner city London!!



Central Perk pop up cafe next to Carnaby Street was absolutely rammed on Saturday...so we decided to pass on that one!!



Brick Lanes Pop Up Sunday Market had a lovely range of small independent designers stalls as well as vintage and retro furniture!



We went for a great night out for a friends house warming/birthday party...interestingly decorated heehee!



We popped into the V&A to see the Fashion Futures Exhibition for The Royal College of Art...they had some amazing collections and the curation of it was lovely...I'll post more pictures soon!



We stumbled upon this lovely shop window exhibition in Knightsbridge ...they had plate covers and hand-knitted sandwiches which were ace!



A really quaint street entertainer with beautiful music that drew you into the performance...



Pop up Religion shop just at the top of Brick Lane...it had a great mixture of clothing and accessories in a mish mash lovely way...Sleep needed now I think...and back to the books!!


 

I have just finished reading a great book by Edwin Datschefski called "The Total Beauty of Sustainable Products". It was an easy to read, light introduction to the ethical and environmental issues we face as new designers, and also did a great job at introducing the reader to a wide variety of already established companies and how they were doing their bit sustain as ing our planets natural attributes. it also had some lovely art work and photographs in there and some great quotes from influential people in the design industry such as Philippe Starck.

I'm now beginning "The Green Imperative" by Victor Papanek which has come highly recommended...so I look forward to immersing myself in this one!!

 

I went to SHOWstudios amazing exhibition at Somerset House yesterday...the layout and execution was amazing and the way you felt included in the exhibits really impressed me. Through interaction between the viewer and the artist you could create a completely different aesthetic to the viewer before you...they had a huge 20 foot statue of Naomi Campbell made using a body scanner and then cast. This then had a digital colour pad projected onto either side which the viewers in the exhibition could draw on her with but more exciting viewer on the internet could log onto the SHOWstudio site and draw on it from there!! My favourite part of the exhibition was a projection on the wall of a film called "more beautiful women" with the likes of Twiggy and other models standing in front of a camcorder for two minutes without any direction, it was awkward and slightly unsettling to watch as you were standing there knowing how uncomfortable it must be to...just stand there!! This was a really well executed exhibition which really inspired me and had so many incredible designers collaborating and experimenting with the digital world in their own work!!