As a study trip for my fashion degree, we travelled to Italy and visited some amazing print design studios. We got to see how the prints were made and one designer showed us how she was hand painting a design straight onto fabric with a simple paint brush. It was amazing to see to many different designs and how quick it was to create. We was not allowed any photographs as they did not want they’re work to be copied or online. However we did get to go into a big closet which was filled of new, old and current designs for inspiration. One collection focused on animals and they’re was a design of a stags head which was painted beautifully with faded edges and the detail of tiny leaves and flowers around the stag was amazing. They’re was a mix of bold prints and colours and soft sketched lines with pastel neutral colours which was a favourite collection of mine.

Another studio we visited called Mantero was amazing to see as they had all the new Chanel and Louis Vuitton prints being made and we got to see the new designs for this winter (2019). Being able to see such big names being printed and the amount of meetings and pattern, colour and fabric choices was very inspiring and made me very excited about my future in the fashion industry.

Before starting my fashion degree I used to buy clothes from popular websites such as pretty little thing, Missguided and boohoo.com. They sell fast fashion and have new styles in every week all which are very on trend and copied styles from celebrities. I did this because I love fashion and being in college at the time and only having a part time job meant I had to watch my money, and these fast fashion websites were cheap and perfect for me to buy clothes from.

Now I’ve started my uni degree and finding out how these fast fashion websites are not good for the environment and have a negative environmental impact such as; water pollution, the use of toxic chemicals and increasing levels of textiles waste.

I’m currently making my first garment for a final piece and the amount of knowledge, patience, skill and time it takes is unbelievable. Now when I see tops and dresses online which are being sold for £10 it makes me think how upset I would be if my garment which I have spent so much time making would be sold only for £10. When I go shopping now I go to Topshop and Riverisland, which are more expensive but reasonable for the amount of work gone into the making of the clothing.

The full skirt and tea length dress, often called the 50s swing dress, are two classic styles from the 1950s. The other classy look was the fitting sheath dress known today as the pencil or wiggle dress. Both styles are a classic and elegant look which women wore either in the day or night.

Grease the movie is based in the 50s shows many different styles from pastel full skirts, to black shiny high waist pants. The full skirt was the most popular in the 50s but the movie does show a lot of styles with women’s trousers and pencil skirts too. One outfit I love in particular is the character called cha cha where she is styled with yellow high waist pants and a matching yellow neck scarf which was also a popular co-ordination to do in the 50s.

Recently I have seen a lot of 50s styles coming back into fashion. High waist belted shorts and knee length tailored shorts are now being seen on fashion influencers all over and in stores. I prefer these elegant looks compared to all the joggers and chunky trainers fashion women are wearing now and hope they do come back into fashion and bring back class to street wear.

As a final for my first year, my tutor gave the fashion group a task of coming up with 6 designs for a final collection. I always wear suits either for casual shopping clothes with trainers and a plain T-shirt or for evening wear with a pair of heels.

After I decided on suits, I had to come up with a theme. I thought about what inspires me and what is always different and eye catching, I chose packaging. Whether it be clothes, food or makeup packaging, it is always different and it’s always around us.

I started researching designers who have done packaging before and came across Jeremy Scott x Moschino collection which was inspired by sweet and fast food packaging. I loved this collection, I thought it was really fun and different and taken inspiration for my designs.

As there are such a wide range of packaging I had to round it down to a certain type of packaging. I chose bread because as I looked in my cupboard it was the first thing I saw and the print isn’t that bold for a suit. I couldn’t imagine any other designer choosing bread for a theme which made me want to do it more.

After I chose my theme I started researching YSL suits as they are the original masters for women’s tailored suits. My tutor gave me a book which showed original YSL designs which are amazing and the illustrations helped me and my designs a lot. I’ve chosen to do a full packaging print on the suit for a first piece, now I’m focusing on just putting the print on the details of the suit such as just on the sleeves or pockets.

The first trip from my fashion course was a trip to Durham to the Bowes Fashion Gallery. The major fashion exhibition shows the work of the amazing catwalk photographer Chris Moore.

Moore has captioned legendary fashion shows including Alexander McQueen, Chanel, Dior, Versace, Vivienne Westwood and Yves Saint Laurent. A favourite piece of mine was seeing Versace’s Marilyn Monroe Dress from his Spring/ summer 1991 collection. The dress was originally shown on the catwalk on model Naomi Campbell, the dress was a straight fitted dress with a bright print of Marilyn’s face all over and then a very detailed beading around the chest and I fell in love with it.

I had never been to a fashion exhibition before and never seen such detail and art in clothing. All my favourite designers had famous pieces shown in the gallery but was shocked to see there was a no picture rule on certain garments. When I looked around the gallery more I did notice people had brought a pad and pencil to actually sketch the designs which I will remember for next time.

Another dress I did manage to see was an Alexander McQueen’s from the collection “Hells Angels and Prolific Demons” Autumn/winter 2010. It is a beautiful gold dress which he had based on angels wings and had a large gold feather collar which carried on all the way to the hips. The garment was incredible to see and the detail was inspiring.

Here are some more of my favourite garments from the Bowes Fashion Gallery