Research and Development

Before we formed our groups, we were tasked with pitching ourselves and our ways of working to everyone who selected the Whitworth Threads brief. For my pitch I chose recent images of resin wearables I've started working on. I believe that the pitch I gave was successful, as I was able to demonstrate some of my skills, my way of working and was able to display my work to other students in order for them to observe how I work. Moreover, I believe it went very well as many other students complimented my work and I found many people wanted to collaborate with me. However, I believe the people I selected along with Rachel (fellow 3D student), were an excellent selection with a good range of skills that I think would well work together. However, at first there was some apprehension about how to incorporate Sasha’s way of working with everyone’s more hands-on processes but I believe as a team we managed to find a way for everyone to contribute.

After initially forming our group and our Pilot Project, we began brainstorming ideas and gathering research. Whilst me and Rachel visited Munich Jewellery Week, (gathering useful research mainly for our own practices but also that could aid our Unit X work), Beck and Sasha visited the Whitworth Gallery and the Manchester Gallery. Their task was to draw comparisons as to how each gallery’s shops were run and the types of customers they received. Once back from our visits, we reconvened and discussed our research and ideas for the project. From our discussions the group decided we would create wearables that were inspired by the Whitworth, however as both me and Rachel were away (missing the formal visit to the gallery), we as a team visited it to gather influential images and flora (seed pots, leaves, twigs) to use for inspiration. As a result of this visit, a decision to focus on the park and gardens of the Whitworth and their community GROW project that they have established, taking from it their idea of promoting mindfulness and healthy wellbeing. Sketches then were drawn from our images from the park and gardens, from which designs started to be formed and ideas of materials and construction began. Initially, these outcomes resulted with our idea to create a necklace inspired by the flora of the park/gardens – a main crochet seed pod that would be cast in porcelain slip, glazed on the inside with natural colours found in the garden. This pod would encase crocheted seeds (based on ones we observed growing around the gallery) and the whole piece suspended on a piece of earthy toned necklace cord. The mindfulness element would be that the customer could choose their necklace and have it as a reminder of their day out at the Whitworth/ of their time in the beautiful park/gardens or even purchase it as a thoughtful gift for a loved one. Moreover, they would have a chance to decide to buy more crochet seed inserts, giving them the chance to change the aesthetic of the necklace to suit their taste. To add to this, from our gallery revisit we decided to place the necklace in a price range of between £17-£45, as we noticed there was a gap in the Whitworth’s lower end price range – plus we discovered they had limited storage facilities for higher end wearables.   

Once decided, everyone was set to work on their parts – me and Rachel were given the task of slip casting the main pods and creating glazes based on our colour palate, Beck had the task of crocheting the outer pods and producing the seed inserts and initially Sasha was tasked with creating mood boards for group presentations with the help of Beck. Whilst Beck crocheted the outer pods, me and Rachel created porcelain glaze test tiles. To create them, the flora we collected from the park and gardens were pressed into to the clay to produce natural patterns. Once these were bisque fired we mixed glazes (the colours of which we all selected as a group) which we then coated the tiles with and fired them again. While Rachel was creating the impressions and mixing the glazes (as she has been inducted into glaze mixing unlike me), I documented the processes by taking photographs. As well as this, I organised the correct pigments/chemicals, rinsed the equipment to prevent contamination of the glazes and aided with the glazing. Once Beck had finished the outer pods, I once again documented Rachel slip casting (as it is one of her skills that, were valuable throughout this project) and helped with preventing any slip contamination. Subsequently after Sasha and Beck had created the mood boards, we pitched to the tutors , one of which suggested to create a truly mindful object to turn the necklace into a D.I.Y kit. In this kit the customer receives a porcelain pod and are provided with a pattern book and the materials to make their own necklace. Moreover the Whitworth not only would sell these in their shop but could also be part of workshops they would run to heighten their promotion of mindfulness. In addition, we were also given helpful advice to utilise Sasha’s digital print skills to make packaging for our new D.I.Y. kit.