(Unit 1 C & D) Pattern Design For Interiors Workshop

I thought I should make a small mention of this, since it's so relevant. It was a two day course at the V&A on the first and last Saturday of the half term (16th and 23rd of February). The aim was to create a design that would be screen printed onto fabric that you could then use to make a bag, pillow or whatever you wanted.

On the first Saturday we walked around the China gallery and the fashion gallery, collecting sketches and pictures to use as inspiration, we took these back to the art room where we the workshop was being held and created mood boards from our drawings and magazine scraps to inspire our designs.

I created a pattern of leaves, that was about 20 inches square, for reference I looked up a few charts with diagrams of leaves on on google images. The inspiration behind this were the curling vines, leaves and flowers on a lot of the pieces in the China gallery. I drew the leaves out in pencil then cut them out with a scalpel, which took me an age, but produced very clean edges. Something that makes the final print all the more professional looking.

I took the stencil with me on the 23rd, and screen printed through it onto a heavy weight of calico, first in a burgundy colour that I mixed using red and black acrylic paint that I'd already mixed with fabric medium, then in red. Which I regretted a little afterwards because I appear to have made a pillow which on one half looks like it was inspired by the Canadian flag (I had maple leaves in my design). It still looks gorgeous anyway.
Once the paint was completely dry I ironed it to fix it, then using the pillow I'd brought with me I measured out the amount I needed, cut it out and pinned it. It took a while for a sewing machine to become free, but once it did I stitched the pieces together in a couple of minutes and had a really neat looking pillow cover. Which you can see here...

This now sitting happily on my bed, and if I do say so myself, it looks wonderful. Below you can see the certificate that I got as proof of finishing the workshop.

I really enjoyed myself, and it made me want to do more screen printing with fabric in the future. Everything looks so sharp and perfect and it was simpler than I thought it would be.