BEYOND AVERAGE

Exam season is well and truly upon us. If you can't hear the sound of students tearing their hair out then you can definitely tell from the quiet of the blogosphere.. everyone's got their heads down revising, or rather trying to learn an entire year's worth of work in one week. Me.. well, I actually quite like exams; the pressure makes me work harder and ultimately gets me a better mark than most of my coursework. I am still feeling the effects though, I've been wearing the same Sugar High jumper and ripped jeans for the past week, sweating my way through Financial Management, International Business and Fashion Marketing revision.

Part of my Product Development final mark is a presentation, which I did with my partner Zabrina to a room of tutors and industry professionals last week. Weirdly enough I enjoy doing presentations too, and doing this one about our own fantasy store was the best yet. We put together everything for our shop Beyond from the target market, business plan and marketing objectives, to the in-store layout and window display. Our USP was that we were a plus-size store, but aimed at women aged 18-25, with seriously fashion forward stuff. Think Nasty Gal for size 14 and up. It was so much fun and we really loved our brand, so much so that we almost wanted to launch it. Almost. Not sure I am quite ready for the plunge into business yet.

Business dress was the requirement for the presentation so that got me out of my jumper and jeans, but I couldn't resist putting a twist on it and looking on-brand for the shop. This is my favourite outfit ever so don't be surprised if you see me outfit-repeat in the future. It's actually a Christmas dress and I think it originally cost about £150 ish full price, so I couldn't resist when I saw it in the sale for fifty squid. Of course I'll wear it at Crimbo but I don't think it' too festive to wear the rest of the year as well. Or at least that's what I'm telling myself!

I'm wearing:

Emma Cook at Topshop dress

Oasis blouse

Jeffrey Campbell Pointe shoes

(there's some on eBay right now)

I've got a giveaway live for a neon orange Glamorous cropped knit! Go go go.

THE FASHION FORECAST

One of my big degree projects this year was to design a stand to promote The Manchester College at Birmingham's Clothes Show Live. The project actually began before summer, when I composed a presentation forecasting trends for next year. After looking at next year's film releases - namely Star Trek, with Benedict Cumberbatch as the baddie (hello!) - and also events - after years of little space exploration there are a handful of space missions in 2013 - I went with the theme of sci-fi. My trend was chosen and I was pretty overjoyed to see sci-fi references trickling through in the spring/summer 2013 shows. Score!

It seemed like we were working on the live project forever but on Tuesday I went to the show to check out our finished stand. The entire class contributed elements of the stand, whether it was the initial trend research and moodboards, or 1/5 scale 3D development, and it was interesting to see how the college technicians and my tutor Valerie (she painted all of the galaxies, bless her) interpreted the final ideas. We also ran an activity to increase the length of time Clothes Show visitors spent on the stand; at one point we had about ten people around our activity table wanting to make mini dresses out of recycled material - sadly the activity had to be cancelled by about 2pm as we ran out of scraps!

The best bit of the entire Clothes Show was the Diet Coke Image catwalk, which was for graduates, university and college students. I might be biased but I thought the college segment was by far the most interesting and creative: another good reason to check out colleges for degrees (as well as the low course fees, small class sizes, yada yada.. I said those things way too many times that day). The Manchester College's garments were created by the Fashion Design degree students from polyester made of recycled bottles, sticking with the sci-fi theme, using colours lifted from Pantone's predicted 2013 scheme.

Of course, as well as manning the stand and being totes profesh, there was a bit of silliness with Harry Styles, studiousness with Caryn Franklin, and quite a lot of shopping. I was so proud to see my pals Paris In Cuffs and Bottle Green Vintage at the show, and it was great to chat to some of my favourite indie brands, including The Bohemian Collective. The last time I went to the Clothes Show was about five years ago, and admittedly it was underwhelming.. apart from seeing The Saturdays in the fashion theatre. Ha. This year I was totally overwhelmed by the crowds and the amount of stuff to see.. maybe I am just getting old but there was too much to see in one day!

Did you go to the Clothes Show? I'd love to know what you thought of The Manchester College's stand if you saw it.

(def chose the wrong t-shirt to photograph.. but this is a super cute baby pink & pale yellow ombré Paris In Cuffs tee)

BUTTON IT

So today I have mainly been counting buttons. Lots and lots of them. I actually had a super fun day sourcing the buttons - they are neither easy to find nor cheap, I assure you - pulling pieces from the shop floor, sorting into packages.. kinda how I wish my job was every day, actually! The counting of the buttons probably wasn't the highlight, but quite necessary: I would tell you exactly how many but this would totally defeat the object. It's part of a competition being run by Oasis Manchester at the Girls' Day Out, this weekend at Manchester Central (that's the GMEX to anyone who's been coming to Manchester for more than a decade); guess the number of buttons in the jar and you're in for a chance of winning a lovely Oasis handbag of your choice.

Come along to the event for another amazing competition - win a meet and greet with Peter Andre!!!.. and also a £250 Oasis gift card. NICE. I'll be there working on Sunday so please do come say hi. See below for a sneak peek of the pieces that'll be coming with us (all set out in packages by yours truly), available for purchase at 15% off retail price.

See you there!

This Weekend I...

Click to read my thoughts on Aintree's Ladies' Day fashion.



My hair-spiration was Alexa Chung, in actuality it's probably closer to Steven Tyler.



"He's totally an up-and-coming designer so they are practically an investment", she said to her boyfriend, to convince herself as much as he.

Dotty's Styling Factory

The fashion industry in the UK is worth approximately £21 billion to the economy, and employs 816,000 people; however I think young people are unaware of the scope for different careers the fashion industry holds. As a teenager I thought that designing was the beginning and end of fashion - how I thought those magazines I worshipped dropped on my doormat every month, how clothes arrived in stores, or how window displays were made, I don't know; the designers obviously magicked everything there with the power of their minds. Even now I am frequently astounded by the jobs available, with thoughts along the lines of "you get to do that for a living?!" - starting with the buyers, merchandisers, and marketers, and stretching all the way to stylists, photographers, and editors. I especially love all the new media and etail job titles - Social Media Managers, Corporate Social Responsibility Assistants, User Assistance Architects, et al. Mindblowing..!

So when The Style Factory gave me the opportunity to run fashion workshops for teens I was delighted to pass on my fashion career-related knowledge. The Style Factory makes the fashion industry accessible for young people, running pattern making, recycled fashion, and even "create your own fashion label" workshops in the North West, and for two days this week took over an (enormous!) empty unit in Runcorn's Halton Lea shopping centre for Fashion In The City. As well as the t-shirt printing, headband making, massages and make-up tutorials already running, yesterday I held styling and visual merchandising workshops using clothing from Room31.co.uk and a couple of props I'd brought along myself. No prizes for spotting the difference I'm afraid.









It was inspiring to find that kids are enthusiastic about window dressing and working in the fashion industry. They were incredibly creative, using scraps of fabric and rubber gloves to make ingenious displays. By far my favourite moment of the day was asking an 11-year-old girl what they would like to do as a job one day. "This", she said. I hope that I helped inspire her to pursue a career in the industry I love so much!

The Peplum Project

I've made clothes before, but they've tended to be made from scraps of fabric I've wound around my body, bothering my mum to pin in place, then sewing messily together on my sewing machine. "That'll do", I thought, despite the item being somewhat mangled. Nobody ever sees the inside, right?

Well, what tends to happen is that I don't wear said homemade clothes, as they fit badly, or are just downright poorly constructed. Happily I have now learnt the error of my ways, and have constructed a skirt correctly - from designing the pattern to the final pressing - and am overjoyed with the result!

The most exciting part for me was the digital printing. After designing the pattern it was printed in the art block at university. Imagine having one of these printers at home! You'd never have to buy an item of clothing again.








From the initial Photoshop design (I played with pixellating images) to the final stage, steaming

For those who are interested, the skirt's pattern is a basic skirt block, using my own measurements. Each piece is overlocked, then sewn together; I used a 20cm lapped zip. I printed 1 metre of fabric and had just enough left over to make a peplum, using a gathering foot to create the frill. Add a waistband, et voila, my finished skirt!




I enjoyed making it, but I'm afraid I won't be taking orders any time soon - the amount of unpicking and resewing I had to do almost drove me nuts. The whole process really made me appreciate just how hard garment producers work, and how difficult it is to get clothing as perfect as it needs to be for a shop floor.

Worn with a simple leather tee here to really show off the colour and pattern; I can see myself using colours from the print to wear on top and clashing it with other patterns. Utterly wearable!