Stud Love/Stud Looks

The Rider Look...

Apple Adverts

Here I have selected a few of my favourite Apple advertisements, I needed inspiration for a current marketing project I am working on. The use of colour and imagery is similar to the outcome I want to get after completing my final designs. 

Millie Mac- Army Love!

Zara Style Page!

Experimenting with new fashion hair styles!

Looking through the latest fashion shows, fashion blogs and trend mags! Me and my good friend Niamh (studied make-up and hair) experimented with the new hair styles we were seeing on the catwalks and in the magazines! 

Here's a few pictures of what we tried out... 

Tie knot bun... simple but a classic office style! 

-Side view. 

Bow Bun! I love this it's in all the magazines... 

One of Niamh's hair and make- ups on Lauren. Simple curls look fab and the smokey eyes (MAC) are really in this Winter particularly on the Top-shop website! 

Twenty top attributes a manager should have!

With studying fashion management next year it's useful to know some basic retail skills that all managers should have. In order to run a company smoothly and manager must be efficient! 

*Good people skills so can engage with the customers wants and needs. 

* Must be able to up-sell a product making sure all sales targets are met! 

*Must be able to engage well with staff and make sure they are happy in the working environment. 

*Should always try and create a positive work environment this gives the employee motivation to come to work. 

*Must have good organisational skills. 

*Time-management skills. Turning up late never looks good to a potential client. 

*Must be able to easily problem solve as employees will come to the manager with queries.

*Should reward staff after good work this provides motivation and will-power to want to come to work and better yourself. 

*Be aware of the competitors and influence employees to be as well. 

*Should always be trying to increase sales new marketing techniques. 

*Good at speaking out and conducting motivational talks to employees. As all employees should have a  clear understanding of the day to day tasks that are asked of them. 

*Make sure staff are happy in the workplace and any problems can be resolved.

*Should always be thinking of new ideas that could benefit the business i.e. Social Media. 

*Should always be polite to staff this helps to build good working relationships. 

*Good money management skills. 

*Should encourage employees to get involved with big projects. 

*Should have a good phone manner as technology is moving forward and this is a key source of communication. 

*Should encourage all employees to get along this provides a better working environment. 

*Should be good at handling paper-work so this business can run smoothly. 

*Look smart- Having a good dress sense makes a massive impact when visiting a client.

Fashion show pictures...

Here are my four final garments on the catwalk. I was really pleased with all four final outcomes and all my designs looked great on the models!

End of year evaluation

Olivia Mullin Evaluation for unit 122 and unit 128




Unit 122…



Title: Pattern Development for Fashion and Clothing.



1 Be able to prepare blocks for pattern construction

2 Be able to make full-scale patterns

3 Be able to prepare a lay plan for production

4 Understand own pattern development.



Unit 128…



Title: Garment production.



1. To be able to operate equipment and machinery correctly for the development of garment production.

2. Be able to evaluate work during the production process.

3. Be able to produce and assemble garments.











I used basic dress blocks to create my dress bodices and used whole dress block for one garment. I did not create any of my own blocks. I patterned on the stand to create pleats going across the bodice and used the stand to create the strap to support the flower detailing. I used the basic dress block to adapt the pattern pieces for my bodice (adapted by removing darts and forming panels) and used a slash and spread technique for garment 1 skirt.



I put my name, garment name, size, grain line, number of pattern piece, cut x, cut on fold information on my pattern pieces. This information is important so that the pieces do not get mixed up and the manufacturer can cut them correctly. This means the correct measurements can be achieved and the patterns can be easily adapted, by using the tracing off method.



When creating my lay plan my choice of fabric meant that I had to consider the width and the best way to fold the fabric. I also had to consider the costing, and to ensure as little fabric waste as possible. This is very important in industry. I learnt from this process: how to do a lay plan (this was my first attempt) also how the process is done in the industry to keep costs as low as possible. I also learnt how industry standard lay plans are done on CAD; this is important for industry as they can be saved for future reference and easily adapted.



After completing my costing sheets I learnt the overall production cost of the garments. In future I could try to keep my costs lower by considering the price of fabrics at the design stage, but still keeping the quality. As I designed for higher end High Street customers I had to balance the costing against quality. Industry professionals would have the same challenge.



Initially, I found CAD very difficult as I didn’t find Adobe Illustrator software very easy to use. I had training from my father, who is a graphic designer and practiced every evening to gain a better understanding of the programme. I also adapted my original spec drawings to a higher technical standard. I found this made my designs look more professional. Spec drawings in industry help manufacturers picture the finished garment. In industry they will feature stich marks, zips, seams and other such details.



I used a domestic over locker for the first time. This gave my garments a more higher end high Street finish, rather than using the industrial over locker. I used the domestic over locker on all my skirts.



The areas of my collection that I sampled were: decorative, layered flowers, to find a method which didn’t fray and which could be mass produced (I needed approximately 70) I also had to sample pleats going across the bodices; I did this by creating a simple stich line and pressing together. The pleating process was particularly difficult. I also sampled a skirt finish (seam area) and created a net sample for the underskirt, by experimenting with gathering and securing the gather. I tried out the domestic over locker to assess the finish.



I was happy with my fabric choice and feel it matched my target customer. I based my whole collection around the Romans and a new and established company called Jones and Jones. My target audience is young women ranging from ages 17-24.

My customer would be fashion forward 'feminine and confident in the way they dress' They would have to be earning a reasonable income ranging from a salary of £1800-£2400 a year as my customer would be buying high end high street. As I wanted all my designs to look very feminine I feel this reflects me as a designer and what I would like my brand name to portray. I feel all my designs have been designed to embrace the female figure particularly the hip area.



High-end high-street uses the best fabrics available for high street trends with perfect finishes. After-all your customer is buying at a higher price tag. In conclusion to this I have used strong and effective Crepes this goes well with my chosen colour pallet. Crepes are a good quality fabric. I feel this worked well for my target market, colours, influences, and designs.



In conclusion, I felt my strengths were the CAD unit, as I am now able to create and adapt garments using adobe and Photoshop. This will help me in the future to translate my ideas into a spec drawing to industry standard. I also felt my flower designs worked out very well and I was pleased with my final colour choice. Pattern cutting is a skill that needs improving, however this is not my chosen career path. I am going on to study a fashion marketing course in Birmingham University in 2013 and will use all the skills gained on this course. I did not enjoy the pattern cutting aspects of the course; nevertheless I really enjoyed the design elements and can improve this area by making my designs more technical in the future. Reflecting on the past academic year I am pleased that I have managed to complete all the coursework, to above my target grade.

Developing my inspirations...

For my fourth final garment for my end of year fashion show I have had to look a series of different looks going across the dresses bodice. Here are a few pictures of how I have developed and changed my research... 

The start of my end of year evaluation

 Customer Profile

I based my whole collection around the Romans and a new and established company called Jones and Jones. My target audience is young women ranging from ages 17-24.
My customer would be fashion forward 'feminine and confident in the way they dress' They would have too be earning a reasonable income ranging from a salary of £1800-£2400 a year as my customer would be buying high end high street.


How did the choice of my design meet my chosen customers needs? 

As I wanted all my designs to look very feminine I feel this reflects me as a designer and what I would like my brand name to portray. I feel all my designs have been designed to embrace the female figure particularly the hip area.

High-end high-street use the best fabrics available for high street trends with perfect finishes. After-all your customer is buying at a higher price tag. In conclusion to this I have used strong and effective Crepes this goes well with my chosen colour pallet. Crepes are a good quality fabric. I feel this worked well for my target market, colours, influences, and designs.

Experimenting with photoshop

Here I have added paint to make the design stand out more my final outcome is shown in my sketch book where I have created Aztec prints down the side of my design. 

For my Final Major project I had to come up with 50 designs which incorporate my theme and colour pallet this one in particular is Aztec print I looked into current trends and repetition to source my inspirations. I have experimented in photo shop to try to digitalise my design and turn it into a reflection of my thoughts and how I could illustrate my design. 

Fashion Forward

Marketing is such a huge must in the fashion industry today. Whether your a gardener or fashion designer promoting your company in the correct way is always going to bring in consumers. Social networking sites are the new IN thing in fashion. Websites like Miss Selfridge and Topshop give you the option to tweet a garment or share via facebook with a personalized message. This is a great way of making a brand/trend more well known. It also gives a company a good indication of what consumers think of their products rather than having to do surveys or questionaires. Topshop and Miss Selfridge also give the consumers the opportuinty to rate a garment you have purchased out of five and to leave feedback. This is then posted on the website and other new consumers can see the rating levels. This could conclude in bad commenting however if the company are getting bad feedback about fittings this could then be seen as a good thing so they can improve for next time when making a similar garment.

Here are two new garments posted on the Topshop website recently I really love both styles! Collars and 50'60's silhouttes are really in this summer both outfits incorporate one of the trends. Topshop advertise their garments on a mannequin and just as a image. Using a mannequin to advertise is a good marketing technique as it gives the consumer an idea as to how the garment is going to fit without it even being purchased. The development of CAD in the fashion industry now enables big companys to allow buyers to zoom in on certain details on a garment!

Lookbooks, style diarys, and trend pages are also a new and up coming thing more and more fashion websites are adding. One of my fave websites that do this is MISS GUIDED they show celebrity styles and always have copies of the new trends but for slighty discounted rates as a pose to stores like ZARA and TOPSHOP.

To

J+J Fashion Show

Here are some pictures from the Jones and Jones Fashion Show...

Jones and Jones illustration

JONES AND JONES

ASOS SHIRT TRENDS

CAD development

Here I have created a sample advertisement for my computer brief I have scanned in my sketch of a butterfly in to Adobe Illustrator. I played around with the shapes and different brush strokes with the pen tool. Experimenting with these techniques have helped me learn more about various things you can do using CAD.

Jones and Jones and marketing...

Marketing Schemes... 


Different stores have different ways of marketing their brand. Jones and Jones are in collaboration with Topshop and various small boutiques. They have a clever technique in Topshop Liverpool of dedicating a area of the store to boutique ranges this is a effective way of boosting the brands profile. Above are pictures of the ST TROPEZ store they have used props to make the consumer embrace the brand and to show what the collection consists of. Props are a good way to highlight the function of clothing eveningwear could be displayed with chandeliers and streamers. The Chupa Chups lollies show jones and jones have been artistic with their props this shows symbolism and a certain narrative to tell in a store window it gives people a reason to question a certain mystery behind a concept not just a easy answer.


The layout... 


A stores layout is critically important. In any business space has to be used effectively and efficiently, it sells to understand the value of space. Products can be allocated set areas in a store for specific trends or looks. From looking at the Jones and Jones blog page I love the use of space between garments in the ST TROPEZ store it gives the consumer a sense of variety and clear options. Competitors like Karen Millen also use this technique to make the store look like each design of garment is individual. I like the way Jones and Jones have used mannequins to show the dresses this gives the feeling to a consumer that the dresses are exclusive and a one off garment. It also gives the a sense of what the dress looks like before you have even tried it on and of course a great use of space within the store layout. 

CAD and the fashion industry

The uses of CAD in the fashion industry…




So many different areas of the fashion industry have now been developed and influenced by advances in computer technology. Today big brands depend on these advances to function on a daily basis the technologies help big companies with organization and accuracy this helps makes various tasks easier, faster, cheaper and sometimes more reliable. CAD is short for computer aided design and CAM is short for computer aided manufacture these two have changed the face of the fashion industry for the better making the fashion trade increase in value.



Fashion Design



There are a wide range of applications and programmers in the fashion industry almost every machine can be fitted with CAD and work smartly and efficiently to a businesses needs.



CAD is used all the time in fashion design the fashion design industry now relies heavily on this. A smart idea may lead to a product; the designer might source inspiration from a large database for e.g. images and videos this can help the designer generate ideas towards the designers collection. In the past designers have took inspiration from books, traveling, previous fashion trends, historic times etc. Today all these things are now available on the Internet or already stored on a database this means the designer does not have to travel to source inspiration behind a collection.



CAD helps the designer understand the concept behind their design. You can now scan images in to illustrator or Photoshop and develop a drawing. By drawing the basic concept illustrator allows the designer to become more flexible with the page graphic design can sometimes be added or text. CAD can enhance the potential of a drawing and allow more flexibility illustrators constantly use this technique and it is widely used by graphic designers



Production in the fashion industry uses CAD/CAM too modify a final garment and erase any flaws so they can be correctly modified for production. Not all designers will be able to visualize the end product; this is where 3D design programs come in handy. The 3D image of the product on the computer screen will help see the pros and the cons before the production process of a garment. This technology is constantly being used in many different areas of fashion not just design as the user can change prints, colour, trims, accessories and embellishments. This can be used on websites and through advertising and fashion promotion.



Fashion Illustration



CAD has made sketching faster and easier mainly because of the tools available in the software where you can draw over a sketch through using the different tools on CAD. Many tutorials are now available over the Internet and the majority of them are free this is helpful for someone training on CAD because it helps them pick up the significant skills. Illustrators find this useful because it helps accomplish drawing speed and a illustration can be created in hours. However creating a illustration manually requires a lot of tools to create results this can be very costly. Illustration requires a firm drawing hand and a full drawing can take hours CAD gives you the option to delete mistakes and create accuracy on the page. CAD has many clever features that artists/illustrators can incorporate in to their designs for e.g. the ability to turn a flat 2-D diagram into a robust three dimensional diagram. The zoom tool allows the viewer to see drawings in great detail. Transforming drawings to 3-D is a clever and constructive new technology that more and more illustrators are using to create initiative ideas and new concepts.



Pattern cutting



The fashion industry now heavily relies on computer technology to use in the pattern cutting process. The technology contains the main aspects you need to adapt patterns. This may include a laptop with pattern cutting, grading and lay planning soft wear, a digitizer, pattern scanner, plotter and cutter. All this helps companies to supply the fashion cutting industry. Stores will often use a basic pattern but adapt it digitally to create different styles or looks according to trends. You will often find sizes in different stores will fit differently a pose to each other this is all to do with digital patterning. For instance a store like River Island will use all the same measurements to ensure their sizes remain the same this is all done through CAD. There are so many different stores in the fashion industry from high end chains like New look and low budget boutiques there is CAD software to suit all budgets and needs. Like anything pattern cutting through CAD can come with benefits and problems, however with these new digital techniques it has come with so many advantages increased speed, digital patterns can be emailed abroad in seconds making the reproduction process quicker, increased accuracy programs like Illustrator allow you to a line shapes and measurements correctly, storage of patterns is eliminated because patterns are stored on software reducing store overheads so cost effective, Multiple copies of patterns can be reproduced when needed. Creating patterns digitally also allows collaborating with creating silhouettes of a first pattern and then scanning in to CAD to get the correct measurements etc. However CAD in pattern cutting also comes with its disadvantages.





Disadvantages of pattern cutting using CAD may include; the fact it takes away the learning process of modelling on the stand then creating patterns, this is a better learning process for a student as they get to manually structure a garment rather than technology doing the measurements for them. Accuracy may also be a disadvantage as a computer has done the measurements it may not always match up to the models size or sizing criteria's. Not all company's will have the funding for CAD mostly smaller business just starting out. CAD is something that is constantly upgrading to bigger and better and it is important to stay up to date with modern technology's to create the best designs, this costs money that not all company's have this could be seen as a disadvantage to a business.



The internet



The internet has been vastly made a huge impact on the fashion industry this is all done through methods of CAD. The internet has particular made a massive impact in fashion marketing and how company's market their products. Brands use computerized technologies and new digital media to market and engage with consumers, because the internet is so widely used one web page can promote a buzz around new product launches if it is posted in the right place. Big brands have took to the location-based social networking like Facebook and twitter. Jimmy Choo have recently promoted iPod clutch pads in their collection this a simple sign that the brand is moving on with the time constantly looking at ways to build the brand name up and something consumers can relate to (the new technologies)

Big fashion brands and even some smaller brands are using CAD to create behind the scenes videos and snapshots that are quickly disrupted over Facebook and twitter this can be seen as ‘trending’ Professionally produced short films are delivered exclusively on company websites and mobile apps so consumers get a feel of what a collection is about. This is where you get a trend setting and high street brands take influence from these videos and all ready made garments from catwalk collections.



From looking into how the social media network is vastly developing I came across LOFT specifically LOFTS Facebook page, the company use ‘real women’ models by modelling clothes themselves and posting them on Facebook. This sparkled a furry of media attention around the Facebook page and got a lot of positive feedback. Many brands are learning that social media networks can be used as a survey where consumers can have their opinion and brands can build upon this. This is where the use of blogs has made such a huge importance in the fashion industry today. Information in spread so vastly through the use of bloggers. Getting the right blogger to promote your brand/collection could make you a over night success. Blogging has allowed fashion houses to keep in touch with what people are really wearing. Blogging has made street style photography a worldwide phoneme it has opened a window to different street styles in various cities and cultures. Bloggers are developing a enhancement in the fashion industry there is a pure relationship between the writer and the reader. The writer bridges talent with friendship between the reader with a added element of business. This reference of business fashion this shows an extension in the fashion industry with a trustworthy source of the blogger connecting with the consumers. However like everything blogs can come with their disadvantages as blogging is all about getting everything quicker and faster company's might feel a lot of pressure to move to a faster pace. Furthermore because blogs are wrote by one independent person its just one persons opinion which will not always necessarily be true. If a fact is written by one person there is never the assurance that it is completely true. The fashion industry is all about learning and sourcing new individual influences the blogging trend does all this for you, blogging does not give you that sense of independence.



“I feel like they’re adding a real dose of freshness and reality to the fashion world online.” – Guardian reporter

Fabric List

Fabrics…




- Black lining material 1 metre

- Grey ling material 0.5 metres

- Purple lining material 0.5 metres

- 2 metres of purple netting

- Medium weight interfacing 1 metre

- Dark grey (similar in weight to black bodice) 1 metre

- Purple fabric (similar in weight to black bodice) 1 metre

- Black crepe for skirt 1.5 metres

- Grey crepe for skirt 1.5 metres

- Both crepes will have to be 130cm wide if not get 2.5metres of each crepe.

- Fabric for skirt for design 4 two layers dark purple and light purple. 175cm wide 2m.25 length 1 of each colour.

New pattern cutting pictures...