Industry Project - Burberry

Day One ( Week One) 

Our first two week project is the "Industry" group project. The aim of this project is to study the work of successful practitioners, and respond to it with a concept for their Autumn/Winter 2014 collection. Within our groups we had to each choose a role to play so that we were able to build up a team of designers, textile designers, photographers, stylists, make-up artists, and even a marketing person, to work towards an accomplished idea for a collection. This task will then give us all as individuals a clearer insight as to what it could be like to be a part of the industry we aspire to work in.  

To initially become inspired, we were given brief presentations on five established Fashion houses, including Burberry, Prada, Mary Katrantzou, J.W Anderson, and Comme Des Garcons. The presentations were designed to give us the key information we needed to know about the history of each brand, their target market, signature garments or iconic features, patterns , colours, inspiration, and the type of garments they design from ready to wear to Haute Couture. These presentations were most definitely useful for the group as a whole, because some of us were unfamiliar with some of the brands, in particular Comme Des Garcons, so it was helpful to become more aware of some contemporary designers.  

To form our groups we all wrote down two Fashion houses we would like to work for, and which role we would like to play within that team. I wrote Burberry as my first choice as it is one of my favourite timeless British brands, and also Mary Katrantzou because of her exciting prints and her use of inspiration from personal objects. I was excited to be put into the Burberry group, and I put myself forward as a Womenswear designer because I felt as though I could contribute more strongly to the group being a part of that field. We began with a group discussion about our roles and how we can all contribute as individuals to the team. It was really interesting to listen to my peers discuss their chosen roles, as I haven't had the oppourtunity to work alongside some of my classmates yet or looked at their ideas and different ways of working, so I am excited to work with my peers who have interests in different areas of Fashion to myself. 

It was diffciult at first to gather an initial concept from our group, as we all had such individual ideas, especailly becasue everyone has their own interests and ways they like to work. We discovered that the best way to listen to everyones views was to start with an initial mind map. We all brainstormed ideas abiut the identity of Burberry, their target market, iconic garments, fabric choices, colour schemes,  and just the general feel we get as individuals when thinking about Burberry as a Brand. This was not only helpful in terms of gaining a greater understanding of the brand we are working for, but it was also a great way of listening to how we all might interpret Burberry within our chosen roles to come up with a new concept for their collection. 

I think that creating a mind map collectivly as a group is going to be essential for the success of this project, as it is something that we can all refer back to for ideas so that our work carries the same message and all links together. I persoanlly find group work quite difficult, as sometimes the concept can be lost when allot of people are working together and constantly sharing ideas, however having an inital refernce like a group mind map will most definatly help our group work towards a really acomplished outcome. 

Day two 

It was important that our group had a theme to inspire a unique concept for Burberry, and to generate some new ideas we became inspired by British Paganism. The theme itself is quite dark and eerie, which has a strong contrast to Burberrys clean cut style, so this should result in some really interesting ideas and design concepts. We also really liked the connection between Paganism and Burberry. I felt as though the organic objects and being at one with the natural outdoors which relates to paganism, has a strong relationship to the idea of  Burberry being all about outerwear and dressing for the typical British weather, so the mix of the two will bring an exciting edge to our ideas.

Moving forward we began to think about how we were going to approach our roles as individuals. Being a womenswear designer, it was important that I worked closely alongside Joanna who is designing for menswear, and of course the accessories team. The womens collection for Burberry normally stems from the mens, so its vital that the design team work closely throughout the project, so that our collections interlink with our theme, and remain true to the traditional style of Burberry, so our work is not vastly different but still incorporates our own individual twist. 

We started by referring back to our initial mind map, and our British Paganism mood board. We wanted to find an aspect of them that we can all carry through into our designs, even if we interpret them differently. I personally was very drawn to some of the Pagan symbols. I loved the intricacy of them, and how the shapes interlocked with one another. We decided as a group to pick three of the same Pagan symbols that we all found interesting to incorporate into our work. 

The three symbols we chose were really quite angelic, and I was already imagining them merging into one pattern or interlocking with each other to form a decorative design feature. I was already familiar with a collection Burberry have recently done using laser cutting. They designed a really stunning laser cut trench coat, and also used the designs on smaller areas of pencil skirts and blouses. This inspired me to maybe re work that idea and use the Pagan symbols to form a new laser cut design. The best way for me to visualise and develop this idea was to actually model it onto a figure and see how the patterns could work together, so I cut some basic silhouettes from paper and moved onto the stand.

Burberry is a very refined and minimalistic brand, so I began by focusing on smaller areas of detail on singular parts of the garment which was the collar for a new Trench coat. I began with ideas for a new collar shape because I wanted to play on the fact that the Trench coat will be an iconic part of the A/W14 collection, and changing the collar shapes and detailing could be quite interesting. I know that Burberry pay strong attention to detail, and I think that this concept could bring a whole new dimension to the collection. I tried to make the collar shape a little more dramatic, so I thought that altering the shape to be circular as oppose to sharp and square could bring an interesting contrast to the prominent detailing of the Pagan symbols. I played around with the different paper templates quite allot, and moved them around onto different areas of the neck to see what worked and what didn't. I much preferred the collar shape when it fell across the shoulder and chest of the manikin,  because I felt it draped a lot better onto the figure and was more representational of the elegance of Burberry , as oppose to the choker style collar which I also experimented with. 

The way I like to design personally is in quite a dramatic and exaggerative way, and as I continued to work onto the stand a member of my group noticed that my ideas may be a little too over the top for Burberry. This was a great oppourtunity for me to refer back to our mind map, and more importantly discuss with the menswear designer as to how I can overcome my problem. I noticed that the menswear designer took a different approach to me in developing her ideas. She began by making some rough initial sketches, which helped her to really capture the silhouette of Burberry and understand the basic foundations of their style. She advised me to begin to make some rough sketches of my own, and then perhaps refer back to her and see how our collections can merge together a bit better, whilst still working to our own individual style. 

Day three

Today I wanted to really try and overcome the problem of my designs being too over powering for Burberry. I thought that the best way to understand the simplicity of their silhouettes was to research into some of their previous collections. I referenced back to their A/W13, and A/W14 collections to get an idea of the shapes and cuts that they carry throughout their collections, and how they've modernised their designs over time. The biggest difference in their recent collections to their older ones was their use of fabrics. The way they have developed their use of fabrics has resulted in even more opulent designs.  For example they have introduced Laminated leather and calf skin trench coats, as oppose to the traditional cotton. They also introduced more of a sheer organza material into the pencil skirts, mixed with a silk collared shirt, showing how they convey contrast through fabric as oppose to design features.

This research really showed me how Burberry remain to keep their heritage style of designing wearable Fashion. The customary style within their collections will always stay the same, so even though they may modernise the trench coat with a new fabric for example, the style of the coat has not changed, and thats the same throughout most garments within their collection. This has therefore inspired me to design keeping the traditions of Burberry in mind and not move away from it too much, so I made some quick sketches from my researched images to help me with this.

I then started to think about the garments I would like to include into my collection. I designed some quick roughs where I was thinking about the types of jackets and trenches I could design, blouses, shirts, pencil skirts, and a few dresses. These garments are most relevant to Burberrys womenswear collections, and it being quite a traditional brand I didn't want to focus on garments such as trousers that are not over apparent in their porsum wear. 

 Designing quite quickly is something I have learned to get used to, and I find it extremely effective in collecting allot of ideas and really capturing the the sort of contour I want to design towards. It did become difficult at times, especially because I wanted to keep my research in mind and not design something thats irrelevant to the style of Burberry, but at the same time I wanted to design using new and fresh ideas. 

My rough sketches were not only helpful for me to become more selective when designing for my final collection, but they were also great for the rest of my group to look at as well, as they were able to select the roughs that they thought would work for the collection and those that didn't, so it was helpful to gather the opinion of my group and to keep working collectively as a team.  

Day Four 

The next stage was to move onto refining my design concepts, so that I can move onto a final collection. Creating a large bulk of roughs was really effective in establishing the right silhouette and style that I should progress my designs towards. I began to really narrow down my  roughs, and worked closely with Joanna the menswear designer to do so. It was important that we both selected similar design concepts that we wanted to push forward, as it was vital that there was a clear link between the two collections. We both agreed on the fact that there should be a balance within the collection in terms of putting outfits together. We met with the styling and promotion team, and they were able to give us some great advise on how to put together our collection. We didn't want the focus to be just on the signature trench coat, because although its important part of the brand we wanted to really show how we've modernised the collection and made changes.

To start my designs for the collection I began to design straight onto a figure, and this really helped me and my group to see how a garment would actually fall onto a more bodily form. I tried to design around 15-20 refined outfits, mixing and matching pencil skirts with jackets, and blouses beneath trench coats. 

I also sketched our laser cutting design features onto some of the garments, and this really showed the identity of our brand and how we've put our own twist onto it. This was the last important part of the design stage for me and my group, as we were able to select the ten final designs  for our A/W13 collection.  

Day 5

Today was the last day for me and my group to work towards our final outcomes before our presentation tomorrow. For myself and Joanna, it was important that we used our time to complete our illustrations for the  collection. It was quite difficult to ensure that our designs marriged together, because we both liked to design in different ways, and sometimes the communication between us got lost. It became harder to design together because we were a little rushed, and perhaps didn't manage our time effectively as we only left ourselves a day to complete our final illustrations.

I worked using design pens for my finals, working towards our group colour scheme of very earthy browns, greens and yellows. I wasn't  at all happy with my final illustrations for this project, as I felt that it was hard for me to connect with a brand as simplistic as Burberry, because I prefer to design so elaborately. To me, my illustrations looked very unprofessional and were not representative of how I normally like to work. I think that using a felt tip pen made it harder to achieve the correct colour palette, and I was unable to really highlight the intricacy of the laser cut detailing which I was a little disappointed about. I spoke to one of my tutors about ways I can improve upon my design work, and she suggested broadening my skills in illustrator and photoshop, so that I am able to achieve a more refined form and clearer colour palette.