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Fig. 6:1 Concept sketches for artworks (February 2006 to August
2007). These were generally pencil
drawings with notes that allowed me to quickly capture
passing ideas. They gave a sense of the
potential look of a garment but did not seek to resolve any structural
or technical issues. Often these
sketches were used in meetings with supervisors when discussing
conceptual approaches to abstract
ideas.
Draping as a method of design development in fashion may be understood as a thinking
process that is driven by the shaping of a design on a dress form (rather than as an
adaptation of existing patterns). In my process a mock were made in cheap material
(calico). This is because in designing a solution to complex garments like those in this
research, multiple mocks needed to be generated and the final fabrics I wanted to use
were either in very short supply, or extremely expensive. While the draping of dress
forms was useful, it did not resolve questions related to weight or the fall of specific
garments.
Fitting as a subsequent process involved modifying the draped garment to accommodate
peculiarities of the design. This allowed me to make fine adjustments to how the cloth
settled on the dress form using constraints and dynamic fields. For example, I could pull
out wrinkles or pin portions of the garment to specific places on the dress form. During
this process I was also able to assign different properties to the panels and set various
attributes of the cloth to change the physical behaviour of the fabric.
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