Primary Interviews with grandmother Jennifer , father , Grandmother Pamela

Me ; So you visited an American Indian reserve?Where was it ?


Nanny Jenny ;Yes , in Canada . It was a plot of land which the Canadian goverment had set aside for the American Indians .



Me ; What kind of events did they hold? Ritual wise


Nanny Jenny ; Yes , when i was there . We was waiting to get the ferry and they were holding boat race . So there was lots of kanus which they race from Vancouver island to all the other islands.

Me ; Was this race a tradition ? And was there any meaning behind it ?


Nanny Jenny ; It was like their sports day . And there was Indian Women sat on the bay , and they were chewing the leather in the traditional way to make shoes and coats .

Me: They chew the leather?

Nanny Jenny ; yeah they put salt on it and chew it , they still do it .

Me ; Does doing this make it plyable ?

Nanny Jenny ; yeah so they can get the correct shape

Me ; Do you think  the sports day would of represented something to do with their spirituality ?

Nanny Jenny ; It was all to do with chasing off the Europeans and other tribes , protecting their tribe .

Me ; In your opinion do you think that the American Indians were wrongly slaughtered and wrongly treated by the europeans ?

Nanny Jenny ; Of course i do , what the Europeans did to them ... Infact , what we did to them also was barbaric .


Nanny Jenny ; I actually met an American Indian Chief outside of the Reserve. Him and his family owned a shop .He was called , Cheaky Yellowhammer.

Me ;So how does he live? Does he live traditionally to his heritage or ?

Nanny Jenny; Well like i said him and his sister owned this shop in , Oakman and they make dreamcatchers and earrings and the jewerelly and they sell all that . Thats where i got my hat aswell , and he christianed me red because i'd bought the hat with the leather tassels . He was lovely he was .




Me ;I find it amazing how the Americans are still taking land off the American Indians which they had reservated for them .. it was theirs to begin with .

Dad ; well yeah , because they can get things like plattinium from their land , uranium and stuff like that .

Nanny Jenny ;there was a congress a long time ago where they fought for the right for the Indian rights .The American Indians have always believed that nobody owned the land , because they lived in harmony with the land like the Animals around them .

Me ; Here what do you think of this , ill read you a short paragraph i've just found and tell me your opinions . '' American Indians struggles still continue today . They are still being taken advantage of to this day .What little portion of their land they are permitted to inhabit by the u.s goverment is bgeing re acquired for the use of toxic waste dumping . Scientists have even come forward to comment on the affects of living near this waste as harmful.


Nanny Pamela ; Sound right to me

Dad ; not surprised at all

Nanny pam ; The land of the free is only free is you're a white American . Thats how its always been and thats how it will always be

Nanny Jenny ; They have to ask for a permit to leave their reserves you know , and also if there isnt a head of their tribe left for more than four months then the land get taken off them .

Me ; Thats horrible .



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I found alot out during these interview . I got more of an understand as so how bad the racisim actually is toward American Indians and how badly the American Indians are taken advantage of by the U.S.A still to this very day . I feel really scared for the world as the country which is most know for premoting and strengthening freedom and equal rights throughout the country neglects the rights of the peoples that were there before any of them . These interviews really made me feel strongly about portraying the affect of this in my garment . It is not only American Indians which are suffering , its their culture and their heritage . It is being washed away and slowly forgotten and faded .

Weekly Diary (12/5/14)

 I drew out the aztec patterns to a 3cm x 3 cm squares . I wanted to make them smaller than in previous samples to make them seam more sophisticated and interact .To make my concept of the culture dying and fading out even stronger , i used the technique to my own advantage by missing a square every now and then and at the bottom of the pattern and continued a few lines to make the fading clearer .

 I then applied my beetroot dye with a sponge , to get the umbre effect . I soaked the fabric in water so that the dye would bleed easier ,i then only applied the dye to the top fabric and using a clean sponge i pulled the dye downwards so that it would face ,  Then to make the beetroot dye darker at the top i kept reapplying the dye to this point after drying it .

 I was really pleased with the result so after it dryed i continued onto painting the fabric .

 Before interfacing . I checked to make sure the farment ganged correctly . I am not taking any notice of the bottom hem yet as i will make it even after all the techniques have been applied .

 Tacking centre back in place with centre fronts.

I found in my research that to make a skirt rounded i must add ease , this is gathering which forces the fabric to take the rounded shape , i then tacked the gathering in place ready to be sewn onto the garment later when all the adjustments to the fittings are made .

After interfacing centre back

I then Added one of the illustrations with black biro pen a chalk . There will be two illustrations on the skirt , one either side .

Weekly Diary (5/5/2014)

This week i looked at my weekly plan and decided that i should make my Natural Dyes and prepare my fabric and drape my final garment ready for the following Monday .I had found in my research that Beetroot dye has a much more vivid colour if made with fresh Beetroot , rather than pickled Beetroot . As there is more colour inside the Beetroot and because the Vinegar that they are pickled in absorbs the majority of the pigment and makes it pink rather than dark Red-pink . I also made a start on dying all my Calico(100% Cotton .) brown with tea and coffee dye . I am using calico on my final garment because it is a naturally made fabric , and apart of my FMP is to use as much natural materials as possible so that my garment gives the same natural and wild visual effect as the American Indian garments . I want to dye my calico brown so that is resembles hide , a material which i found in my research the American Indians used as a biproduct of their food (Buffalo) .

 To make the Natural Beetroot dye , i found in my research that i must cut the Beetroot into slices so that all the segments which hold the pigment are exposed in the most efficient way possible.Then i placed them into a saucepan and filled the saucepan up with water until it just covered the beetroot . Then i brought it to the boil and let it simmer for 8 hours so i could be assured that i got the most pigment out of the Beetroot as possible.

 The beetroot on the boil . If i wanted a darker colour then i would of left the lid off so that the water boils off and gives me more beetroot pigment to part water , making the colour more concerntrated .

 I then used 7 teabags and boiled the to make my tea dye . I then added a cup of coffee to the 2000ml mix to make the colour darker.

 After using a salt fixitive on my calico fabric i massaged the fabric into the dye bath of tea and coffee . Massaging the fabric assures that there are no patches which havent taken to the dye. I found this out through experimentation .I let the fabric sit in the dye bath for 3 hours .


 Draping My Final Garment .
 I wanted to drape my final garment because i wanted to move away from the standard princess line bodice pattern . I wanted to experiment with the darts . Also i wanted to try and make two darts which make a triangular shape so that it links to my American Indian research . I was happy with the  result of this experimentation .

 centre front of the jacket .

Centre back of the jacket . The shape hasn't been achieved yet .

I made a list of what order the techniques of making my garment need to be in ;

Order Of Techniques ;

1. Drape and Pin Fabric .
2. Tack all darts and seams into place .
3. Wax batik fabric .
4. Dye fabric with umbre and using Beetroot dye .
5. Paint fabric 
6. Interface Fabric
7. Draw illustrations on fabric 
8. Add hems
9. add cutting back techniques 
10. Finishing touches and final fittings .

6 FMP Digital Flat Designs

Weekly Diary (28/ /13)

This week i focused my efforts on sampling from my designs to refine my final garment designs in order to come up with a more developed final collection and final garment .I was really happy with the result because the visual effects of the smocking and the umbre dying came out just as i imagined it in my minds eye .I will definitely use take these sleeves forward into my final fashion collection. However i would make the square aztec pattern smaller so it gives a more mature and interact visual effect .

 Sleeve and bodice sample
techniques ;

1. Wax batiq
2. Smocking 
3. Natural dyes
4. umbre 
5. pleating 

I used pleates like this because i saw in my research that many American Indians used bone ribbing on the chest of their garment . To recreate this into a fashion garment i used the pleates in the same way . I think that the ribbs on their chest were to prove strength and leadership so i wanted to include it in my designs . i will be also taking this forward in my final fashion collection .

 Bodice sample ;
Techniques;

1. Cutting back 
2. Applique 
3. pleating 
4. Natural dyes

I draped this skirt so that it looked a lot the female American Indian ponchos from my research , which have excess fabric hanging from the side seams .I will take this forward into my collection because it does look quite authentic to in my opinion and when i asked a peer (Hilal) he said that he really like it and that it looks really authentic as well .

 Skirt and bodice sample
Techiques;

1. Draping
2. pleating 
3. Cutting back

 This is the pattern cutting i had to do in order to make my scaled down triangular seam skirt.

Jacket Dress Half Toile

This is a toile of my final design . I wanted to make this my final design because i am really fond of this shape .I have created this final design by mixing two of my best designs together . It is a jacket dress because originally i wanted to make garments which would be layered up like the American Indian garments.But because of time management i decided to design a Jacket which seems to have a dress underneath . I did this by using a thin calico for the collar segment of the dress and then using a heavy duty calico for the rest of the dress .

Techniques i am going to use on this toile ;

1. Pattern cutting
2. Cutting Back 
3. Fabric Fusion 
4. Natural Dyes
5. Umbre 
6. Biro And Chalk Drawing 
7. Wax Batiq 
8. Triangular seam pattern cutting (Skirt of the dress.)

I didn't like the result of this triangular seam cutting , because it was too difficult to refine on a small toile , however if i was going to use it on my final garment . I would cut the pattern with a bigger seam allowance to make room for mis-fitting seams and mistakes .

 Miniture Skirt Sample with triangle pattern seams
Techniques

1. Pattern Cutting 

This is my favorite sleeve because the cutting back acts like a whole new layer . It contributes to my idea of layering up fabric very well . I am definitely going to take this sleeve design forward into my final collection because it has alot of lovely techniques which add to the visual interest . However i will decrease the scale of the wax batik American Indian patterns so that it doesn't seem unrefined or look childish /. 

 sleeve one ;
Techniques ;

1. Wax Batiq 
2. Natural Dye
3. Umbre
4. Cutting Back 
5. Fabric Fusion
6. Pattern Cutting

Sleeve 2

Techniques ;

1. Wax Batiq
2. Umbre
3. Smocking

Developed Moodboard

This moodboard is my second moodboard , however I am going to be replacing the first moodboard with this moodboard , as I have developed my research for my theme and this moodboard links completely and is relevant whereas the other one was done earlier in the project and was still un developed . Whereas now I have stronger research and I know exactly what I want to do .

Indian Spirit - Thomas Yellowtail (Book)