The Second Year of My Costume Degree
The image opposite is an experiment I produced in the second year of my degree during a workshop experimenting with the application of silicone on stretchy fabrics.
So join me and find out about the enormous wig I made, what I got up to when I lived in the 13th most haunted town in America and what I really feel about George Clooney.
This is lens about the costume degree I studied and will eventually be a lensography of my Costume lenses with a bit more information about when and why I did certain projects.
More lenses will be added as I work my way through all my old coursework and remember all the bits and pieces of work I produced!
So join me and find out about the enormous wig I made, what I got up to when I lived in the 13th most haunted town in America and what I really feel about George Clooney.
This is lens about the costume degree I studied and will eventually be a lensography of my Costume lenses with a bit more information about when and why I did certain projects.
More lenses will be added as I work my way through all my old coursework and remember all the bits and pieces of work I produced!
Summary of the Second Year
Including:
The Tempest
I loved the Tempest project. We'd mostly said goodbye to all those hard going dreary... I mean, delightful and instructive... period costume procutions and now it was time for a little fun!
I looked at all sorts of things to inspire my production of the Tempest which was a crazy red and yellow fantasy piece, like the Lion King musical and Gaudi's architecture. OK, so it's Shakespeare, but it's also the tale of two stranded islanders and a sprite and goddesses and the mutant son of a witch.
We also got to make one of our costume designs in the end and I chose Ceres, one of the masque goddesses, which was cool apart from the fact that I designed the costume to be worn on stilits. Might have bitten off more than I could chew there!
The Rivals and the 18th Century
Oh no! I spoke too soon! Yep another yawnsome period costume piece.
I wouldn't agree with that now though. I love crazy 1700s Marie Antoinette hair. I wish I'd gotten a bit more into the research and produced fabric samples for this project and also looked at Marie Antoinette and done a case study on her or something. Maybe that's the problem - it probably would have been much more fun to design costumes for something like the Marie Antoinette film that came out a few years ago rather than a musty old play!
I don't think we ever produced any final designs for The Rivals but I do quite like the quick water colour sketches I made for my design development.
My American Exchange experience
I decided to take part in the American exchange one of the tutors on my course offered, which is pretty weird and random for me considering that I hate being in new situations and I hate going off on my own. I did this instead of doing work experience (although I did have two week's work experience in a little local theatre in Exeter). I'm really glad I did go to America but I wish I'd also taken on some more work experience on films and in theatres whilst I took my degree. Maybe I would be in working in costume right now if I had.
I studied in the theatre department of Ohio State University for two months which was a lot of fun. My degree course didn't produce costumes for specific productions but at OU I got to make costumes that were actually worn in the university's theatre productions.
A workshop in Silicone Manipulation
This was so much fun. I can't remember what the name of the lady was who took this workshop but what she does with stretchy fabrics and silicone is amazing. Just have a look at the samples i produced further down the page and you'll see how cool this technique is.
Circus Beckett
This was the production I produced costumes for at OU. Beckett can be fairly dreary but this production involved circus acts like people on high swings and walking across tight ropes.
L'enfant et les Sortileges
This was another project I produced whilst I was in America. It was for a really cute opera for kids. The textiles samples were produced when I got back to my home in Bournemouth as I didn't have any fabric with me in America.
The Importance of Being Earnest and the Victorian Period
I love Oscar Wilde so I did enjoy this project. I produced a file of costume reasearch and took it with me to Ohio. They were studying the Importance of Being Earnest there too and I learnt the basics of how to use Photoshop there. I think if I hadn't taken those classes then I would never have learnt how to use Photoshop so i'm very grateful for those lessons, wven if I only know the very basics.
Actually learning how to, you know, sew and stuff
At some point during this year, our tutors realised that we didn't actually know how to do different things like sew button holes and makes pletes or what kind of seams you use on what projects so we hastily made lots of different samples!
The Tempest
I loved the Tempest project. We'd mostly said goodbye to all those hard going dreary... I mean, delightful and instructive... period costume procutions and now it was time for a little fun!
I looked at all sorts of things to inspire my production of the Tempest which was a crazy red and yellow fantasy piece, like the Lion King musical and Gaudi's architecture. OK, so it's Shakespeare, but it's also the tale of two stranded islanders and a sprite and goddesses and the mutant son of a witch.
We also got to make one of our costume designs in the end and I chose Ceres, one of the masque goddesses, which was cool apart from the fact that I designed the costume to be worn on stilits. Might have bitten off more than I could chew there!
The Rivals and the 18th Century
Oh no! I spoke too soon! Yep another yawnsome period costume piece.
I wouldn't agree with that now though. I love crazy 1700s Marie Antoinette hair. I wish I'd gotten a bit more into the research and produced fabric samples for this project and also looked at Marie Antoinette and done a case study on her or something. Maybe that's the problem - it probably would have been much more fun to design costumes for something like the Marie Antoinette film that came out a few years ago rather than a musty old play!
I don't think we ever produced any final designs for The Rivals but I do quite like the quick water colour sketches I made for my design development.
My American Exchange experience
I decided to take part in the American exchange one of the tutors on my course offered, which is pretty weird and random for me considering that I hate being in new situations and I hate going off on my own. I did this instead of doing work experience (although I did have two week's work experience in a little local theatre in Exeter). I'm really glad I did go to America but I wish I'd also taken on some more work experience on films and in theatres whilst I took my degree. Maybe I would be in working in costume right now if I had.
I studied in the theatre department of Ohio State University for two months which was a lot of fun. My degree course didn't produce costumes for specific productions but at OU I got to make costumes that were actually worn in the university's theatre productions.
A workshop in Silicone Manipulation
This was so much fun. I can't remember what the name of the lady was who took this workshop but what she does with stretchy fabrics and silicone is amazing. Just have a look at the samples i produced further down the page and you'll see how cool this technique is.
Circus Beckett
This was the production I produced costumes for at OU. Beckett can be fairly dreary but this production involved circus acts like people on high swings and walking across tight ropes.
L'enfant et les Sortileges
This was another project I produced whilst I was in America. It was for a really cute opera for kids. The textiles samples were produced when I got back to my home in Bournemouth as I didn't have any fabric with me in America.
The Importance of Being Earnest and the Victorian Period
I love Oscar Wilde so I did enjoy this project. I produced a file of costume reasearch and took it with me to Ohio. They were studying the Importance of Being Earnest there too and I learnt the basics of how to use Photoshop there. I think if I hadn't taken those classes then I would never have learnt how to use Photoshop so i'm very grateful for those lessons, wven if I only know the very basics.
Actually learning how to, you know, sew and stuff
At some point during this year, our tutors realised that we didn't actually know how to do different things like sew button holes and makes pletes or what kind of seams you use on what projects so we hastily made lots of different samples!
The Tempest
William Shakespeare.
You can find out more about this project in the two lenses listed below.
This is still one of my favourite projects I ever produced (well the design half, the costume construction was a little frustrating as I gave myself a bit too much of a challenge although I do adore the gorgeous, enormous and quite ridiculous headdress I made).
I love my Tempest sketchbook, it's totally full and bulging full of textiles samples and photocopies and yummy pictures and just great whimsical glistening stuff.
This is one of those projects where I really felt like I was having a good time. Of course half of the reason why I probably was able to produce so much work for this book was because I worked on it in the summer when I was home in the middle of the country on my own.
This is still one of my favourite projects I ever produced (well the design half, the costume construction was a little frustrating as I gave myself a bit too much of a challenge although I do adore the gorgeous, enormous and quite ridiculous headdress I made).
I love my Tempest sketchbook, it's totally full and bulging full of textiles samples and photocopies and yummy pictures and just great whimsical glistening stuff.
This is one of those projects where I really felt like I was having a good time. Of course half of the reason why I probably was able to produce so much work for this book was because I worked on it in the summer when I was home in the middle of the country on my own.
The Rivals
Richard Brinsley Sheridan.
Oh no, not another one.
*Sigh*
Another period costume project!
My research for this project is a bit random although seemingly thorough. Like I said above, in the summary, I wish I'd really got into the research and designs of this project. I guess we probably had too much else going on at the time to really knuckle down with it.
I do like the quick initial paintings I made for the costumes although they are fairly simple. You can find them in the gallery below.
*Sigh*
Another period costume project!
My research for this project is a bit random although seemingly thorough. Like I said above, in the summary, I wish I'd really got into the research and designs of this project. I guess we probably had too much else going on at the time to really knuckle down with it.
I do like the quick initial paintings I made for the costumes although they are fairly simple. You can find them in the gallery below.
The Rivals: A Comedy
Amazon Price: $18.98 (as of 05/31/2012)
The Rivals is a play from the late 1700s, set in Bath in England.
The main characters are the lovers Lydia and Jack - Jack who pretends to be a poor soldier because Lydia's obsessed with romance and what's more romantic than eloping with an impoverished military man?
The comedy mainly comes from the character Mrs Malaprop who gets all her words from (this play is where the term malapropism comes from).
Athens, Ohio
Athens, Ohio was a great place to visit. I didn't get out and see much and the place was pretty small but I was busy working anyway.
When I first got there it was snowing but by the time I left the weather was hot as I stayed there for two months.
I learnt a lot whilst I was there, more than I've got down here because I simply can't remember it all.
I even got to go up to the haunted cemetary and abandoned assylum in the dead of night. Gah!
Silicone Workshop
This was so much fun and right up my street.
There were other times in this degree when we got to experiment with textiles and I spent a lot of time myself making samples and sitting in the dyeing room working on torturing cloth in different ways but this was something I'd never even seen before.
Basically you have to stretched stretcy fabric out on boards and then you crush silicone (the stuff that you put in a gun that you use for bathrooms) into the fabric. Once it's all dried you take your fabric off the board and you get some amazing results. My favourite is the "rings" sample that I used for the intro image.
There were other times in this degree when we got to experiment with textiles and I spent a lot of time myself making samples and sitting in the dyeing room working on torturing cloth in different ways but this was something I'd never even seen before.
Basically you have to stretched stretcy fabric out on boards and then you crush silicone (the stuff that you put in a gun that you use for bathrooms) into the fabric. Once it's all dried you take your fabric off the board and you get some amazing results. My favourite is the "rings" sample that I used for the intro image.
Circus Beckett
This was a pretty cool project. I was basically working from designs that my American tutor had made and we were using costumes that were already in the store and altering them.
I also got to make some headpieces from scratch (see below) which I loved doing after having so much fun making the head piece for my Ceres costume (see above). I learnt how to use this mouldable plastic stuff and bend it into a headdress shape to use it as a base.
We also did fun things like spray painting place mats silver and attaching them to dresses.
Circus Beckett was a production of Beckett plays (I believe mainly monologues) which were designed to be part of a circus.
I also got to make some headpieces from scratch (see below) which I loved doing after having so much fun making the head piece for my Ceres costume (see above). I learnt how to use this mouldable plastic stuff and bend it into a headdress shape to use it as a base.
We also did fun things like spray painting place mats silver and attaching them to dresses.
Circus Beckett was a production of Beckett plays (I believe mainly monologues) which were designed to be part of a circus.
L'enfant et les Sortileges
Ravel.
I adored this project, it was so cute. This is another project I produced in the US.
It's an opera for children that features lots of animal characters and it was a lot of fun to design.
I drew on my bedroom walls a lot with crayons when I was a child so I used that as inspiration, buying some wax crayons and messing about with scribbles in my designs. I also featured lolly pops and jelly beans.
Check this project out in the lens below.
It's an opera for children that features lots of animal characters and it was a lot of fun to design.
I drew on my bedroom walls a lot with crayons when I was a child so I used that as inspiration, buying some wax crayons and messing about with scribbles in my designs. I also featured lolly pops and jelly beans.
Check this project out in the lens below.
The Importance of Being Earnest
The Importance of Earnest was another project that had the potential to be terribly boring, but I love Oscar Wilde and halfway through this project I went off to America and learnt about Photoshop.
I wish I'd thought more about using Photoshop for my costume designs before although I'm sure I would have been told that I had to learn to draw! Because I leanrt how to use the computer during this project it helped me in my final year when I used collages miniture repeated printouts of photos of my textiles pieces - that got around those pesky tutors who told us we had to capture the fabric samples perfectly in our designs! Well once you see my textiles samples you'll probably understand why this would have been impossible for me!
Anyway you can find out more about The Importance of Being Earnest in the lens below.
I wish I'd thought more about using Photoshop for my costume designs before although I'm sure I would have been told that I had to learn to draw! Because I leanrt how to use the computer during this project it helped me in my final year when I used collages miniture repeated printouts of photos of my textiles pieces - that got around those pesky tutors who told us we had to capture the fabric samples perfectly in our designs! Well once you see my textiles samples you'll probably understand why this would have been impossible for me!
Anyway you can find out more about The Importance of Being Earnest in the lens below.
O Brother Where Art Thou?
I first watched this film with friends and we found it so bizarre that we got really obsessed with it.
I decided to write an essay on it in the second year of my degree, hey, why not?
So I set off to research clothing in the Great Depression - not so easy when you're British and don't really have much clue about the Depression at all. I hadn't even read The Grapes of Wrath or Of Mice and Men, but I had seen O Brother Where Art Thou? No I do not think George Clooney is kind of hunky. I think he's kind of old.
I recently went through my old Cultural and Historical Studies folder (as well as studying costume history in our project work we also studied it in lectures as well as all sorts of other design, film, history etc and random things like how microwaved food cooks your insides) and found huge wodges of photocopied images of Depression era folk - none of which I used in my final essay. But don't worry I'm putting all that paper to good use now and doodling on the back of it.
I decided to write an essay on it in the second year of my degree, hey, why not?
So I set off to research clothing in the Great Depression - not so easy when you're British and don't really have much clue about the Depression at all. I hadn't even read The Grapes of Wrath or Of Mice and Men, but I had seen O Brother Where Art Thou? No I do not think George Clooney is kind of hunky. I think he's kind of old.
I recently went through my old Cultural and Historical Studies folder (as well as studying costume history in our project work we also studied it in lectures as well as all sorts of other design, film, history etc and random things like how microwaved food cooks your insides) and found huge wodges of photocopied images of Depression era folk - none of which I used in my final essay. But don't worry I'm putting all that paper to good use now and doodling on the back of it.
O Brother, Where Art Thou?
Amazon Price: $5.19 (as of 05/31/2012)
Oh Brother Where Art Thou? stars George Clooney.
Need I say more? OK I do.
It's a retelling of The Odyssey (no really! There's a giant cyclops and everything! Kind of). It's a little insane, has a great soundtrack and you should watch it.
Find Out About My Other Costume Degree Years
About Melted Rachel
Textiles Artist.
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MeltedRachel
I'm Rachel, a textiles artist from the southwest of England.
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