Creative [SIN]ergy organised a fashion workshop for AEP (Art Elective Programme) students visiting from Singapore. The workshop was held at Dragon Hall in Covent Garden on Saturday 19 June 2010. The group was a mix of 15 Secondary students from Cedar Girls and Tanjong Katong Girls.
The Fashion workshop was conducted by Fashion Designer and Creative [SIN]ergy member, Lilia Yip. She shared with the students first-hand experience of working as a fashion designer in the UK and introduce them to the ideas generation process. Engaging students in hands-on activities and discussion about the first stage of the design process which involves research and collation of inspiration and information.
Lilia started the workshop with a quick ice-breaker called Dress A Friend in Ten. The students were divided into groups and given ten minutes to select one person per group to dress up with materials and present their creation to the class. This was a good warm up and it got students acquainted with how materials work on the body, basic techniques of draping and how to generate ideas quickly.
This was followed by a well orchestrated presentation on What is fashion design? What are the fundamentals (such as form, colour and material) that every designer needs to decide upon? Where and how do designers get their inspiration and ideas?The finally activity was called Idea Collage. The groups prepared beforehand, bringing to the workshop images they like from fashion designers, photographers, artists, musicians, images they have taken themselves. These images were from magazines, the internet, photocopied from books, film stills, photos, scraps of fabric or a particular button.
Using the images they had as well as ideas from the ice-breaker, each group brainstorm on a concept for one garment design showing the colour, form and materials they have decided on.Creating a collage that will act as a mood board showing the colour, shape and material and overall concept for a garment and presented to the class for discussion.
This activity gave students a hands-on experience of how to research and edit their ideas. It also introduces students to the basic principles of fashion design, which are in essence art, cultural and social aesthetics with a human interaction and wearability function.
The workshop concluded with a discussion of the emergence of sustainable and ethical fashion.
