Woolly Woolly, Softly Softly Dawanda

Perfect for the approaching winter, these felt necklaces
will make you feel all cosy and warm :

1 Turquoise Felt Necklace, Euro 38.00 by VaiVa
2 Felted Brooch, Euro 13.00 by VaiVa
3 Felt Necklace, Euro 34.00 by Janine Joneg at
SIDHEfilzgeschmueckt
4 Felt Necklace, Euro 36.00 by Janine Joneg at
SIDHEfilzgeschmueckt
5 Purple Peeble felted necklace, Euro 18.50
by Noni82 at Odd and Wolly
6 Gemstone felted necklace, Euro 18.50
by Noni82 at Odd and Wolly
7 Random Circles Necklace, Euro 12.60
by CreateItCottage
8 Satelite Necklace, Euro 10.00
by Kimusa

All these and more woolly goodness
can be found at Dawanda,
or you can learn to make your own
right here
(Thanks to Vaiva for the link).

Picture Me Beautiful

Woolf

Fellow Italian and amazing photographer Federico Erra has, in my opinion, one of the most exciting flick'r photo stream

Last Leti

His subject are breathtakingly
beautiful sultry girls

Neptune

The chemistry between Federico and his beautiful models is almost
palpable, his pictures are sensual, delicate and a touch
melancholic.

The Motion Of Taxis Excite Me

New Beginnings

One of the bloggers I discovered at the beginning of my blogging adventure, and still one of my favourites, is Ambika of (Into) The Fray ... she's one of the nicest girls in the blog sphere and admittedly one of the only people that ever comments on my blog, plus she once named one of her jewellery pieces after me ... so yes, I have a soft spot for her!

Coral Droplets Necklace $ 18.00

Today when I opened my IGoogle reader I had a little heart attack when I read "The end of The Fray" on the title of Ambika post ... what!?! I exclaimed ... no, certainly not!
Turns out I jumped the gun a little and all was revealed on reading the actual post, Ambika has taken the plunge and moved to her own domain ... right here, yeah for that!

Zekiyah Necklace $ 16.50

Ambika isn't just lovely, she's also extremely talented ... I followed her foray into sewing and jewellery making and I am impressed ... her shop on Etsy features her amazing jewellery
and accessories all at very reasonable prices.
[Hand off the bosphorus earrings, they are mine!]

Bosphorus Earrings $ 12.00

So I want to wish you good luck in your new adventure darling Ambika!

Adam Lowe & The Boyfriend Stash

My lovely boyfriend has an ever growing stash of magazines, they are everywhere, under the bed, piled against walls .... nothing to worry about, no top-shelves publications called Jugs Galore or TitsMonthly, I would certainly start worrying if he bought that kind of mag since they don't actually exist and my assets in that department are seriously lacking!
No, his obsession is with Computer Arts Magazine , at first I ignored it as it seemed quite technical, it's packed full of Photoshop and Illustrator tutorials, and although I keep telling myself that I will sit down and attempt one of these I just can seem to find the time or the inclination at the moment! More and more I find myself snatching the magazine from his hands with exclamations like "My God!That's amazing ... Who is it? Let me see ..." and proceed to hog it, and don't you hate when people do that?
In each issue they showcase talented designers and illustrators, some emerging and other
established. I will definitely dip into the older issues to display some of my favourites
on this here little blog!

In the latest issue to appear in the house I was captivated by Adam Lowe fashion illustration, again is the sketchiness of his drawing that attracted me, the messy but delicate colouring.

Enjoy!

Techno Threads - Part 3

FABRIC LABORATORY

this section of the exhibition is
looking at the lastest advances in fabric technology

Yoshiki Hishinuma
developed a range of 3D knitted garments instead of
taking a flat cloth and cutting and stitching it to make a
3D form, sometimes even the buttons in his
garments are knitted in this way.
Present at the Science Gallery were
garments from his 2005 collection.



Jacob Schlaepfer Combines laser-cutting,

embroidery and embossing to create fabrics that are technically advanced
and have a futuristic feel and aesthetic.

Rebecca Early is a London based textile designer exploring new dyieng techniques. Using exhaust dyieng and reusing the dye bath several times so each garment becomes paler and unique.

Also included in this section were: Grado Zero Espace, the Aerogel jacket is made from the lightest solid in the world, so light that in its purest form actually floats on air. The good news is that the material is highly insulating which means that althought the textile is extra light it will keep you lovely and warm!

For more informations on all this marvellous textiles
and great technological innovations please
visit the Science Gallery website.

Techno Threads - Part 2

AESTHETIC AND SCIENCE

This part of the exhibition looks at how science and science-fiction has
inspired fashion.

Manish Arora was inspired by space odyssey for his 2007
Autumn/Winter Collection,
faboulously kithy motifs are realized by using
traditional embroidery , applique and beading.
I was really fascinated by these, the details
where amazing and humourous,
plus I'm a sucker for sparkles of any
sorts so this won me over straight away!

Shelley Fox
was inspired by braille and moon
writing for her 1998 Autumn/Winter Collection,
the braille markings are embossed
on the wool fabric, saying things like
"This is a A Line Skirt" or "This Is A
Dress" ... the collection was inspired by a braille
book found in a skip, upon further research with the RNIB Shelley discovered
that at times a blind person clothes might have a
button with braille markings with the colour
of the garment.

Claudy Jongstra Combining raw silk, merino wool and silk chiffon Claudy Jongstra felted fabrics are richly coloured and textured. Donna Karan has used her felt for a couple of seasons, John Galliano and Christian Lacroix have made coats using her bespoke felt fabrics and they where even used for costumes in the first episode of Star Wars, but her greatest collaboration is with designer Alexander Von Slobbe, her fabrics are central to his collections, the collaboration started in 2002 is part of an ongoing research exploring new ways of colouring felt.

Walter Van Beirendonck is well known for his costumes for U2's PopMart tour, including Bono's "Bubble" suit. His Summer 2008 collection, intitled Sexclown explores virtual identity, avatars, masculinity and body identity.

Knowwear

BrandX art installation illustrates what a future disease caused by brand addiction might look like, a rash of logo spreads from designer sunglasses to the body ... hugh, scary!

For more information please visit the Science Gallery website.

Techno Techno Techno [Threads] - Part 1

First of all let me apologize for my absence from this blog all last week, I know I'm not a prolific blogger at the best of times but disappearing after promising a post is bad form! Anywho ... lets get to the Technothreads post ... the exhibition is closed now but I think it was interesting enough to post about it now and you can go click click to find out about all the amazing technologies applied to textiles and fashion.
As I said before this was my second visit to the exhibition, the first time I didn't have my camera and the experience was marred by the presence of small children on a sugar high running around like lunatics, cute as they were. Oh well ... this time around no kids to be seen, apart for my boyfriend and I, that is,
so we had a chance to enjoy the all thing.

****

The exibition was divided into three sections:

CONCEPTUAL COUTURE

concentrating on the use of science and technology by fahion designers and artists. Ranging from clothes that can be sprayed directly onto the body, to the use of electroluminescent wires causing garments to glow and semi-living clothes that use the latest advances in biotecnology.
All this works are at the experimental stages but they point to the future in clothing.




Hussein Chalayan amazing morphing clothes,
from his 2007 spring/summer collection. I was excited to see these up close!




Critz Campell
is a Chicago based designer, this dress uses
electroluminescent cable as embroidery, the dress is handmade and the decoration
machine made, an example of how techonolgy is subverting
the rules of design.

Manel Torres of Fabrican investigates new ways to speed up
the process of constructing garments.
Literally fabric in a can, it fits the body like a second skin,
the technology is at its first steps therefore the fabric is
unstable, but in the future it will be possible to apply this
technology in the fashion, medical and hygene industries.

Donna Franklin and Gary Cass wine dress, cultivated from a fermentation of
red wine solution to create a seamless, byosynthetic garment.
The end material is cotton like and fits snugly to the body, almost like a second
skin.
The same process as been applied to the Guinnes dress ...
althought interesting I found these a bit gross, the smell of the
Guinness dress was revolting!

Freedom Of Creation designs on a 3D CAD file

then uses a digital manufacturing process such as Laser Sintering Machine
to "print" layer upon layer.
I have seen the use of rapid manufacturing technology before, applied
to objects ... I was blown away by its use for garments and
accessories ... this amazing dress and the cute bag
are similar to chainmail but very light weight.

Also included in this section [sorry, no pics!] where :

Cute Circuit
hugh shirt which is embedded with sensors that sense and
respond to touch, the warmth of the skin and the heartbeat rate of the
sender. The sensors are linked to actuators that respond
to stimuli and recreate the sensation of touch, warmth and emotion
of the hugh to the shirt of the distant loved one.

Alyce Santoro
Sonic Fabric project, she used 50% recycled audio cassete tape and
50% cotton weaving them to form fabric ... the amazing thing
about this dress is that if you run a tape head over the
fabric it creates a sound!

Suzi Webster
A Canadian multimedia artist and creator of
Electric Skin



Oron Catts
Victimless Leather

For more information on this exhibition please visit the Science Gallery website.