A Twisted Love Affair...

It gives me great pleasure to finally present to you all my final year of University graduate collection, man it feels good to say that!! I've been working extremely hard since last September with my focus solely committed to this project! During last summer whilst out on my DPP (placement year) it was time to start putting concept ideas together to present to my tutors on my return to university, I had no idea what I wanted to do or even the slightest clue of where to start, all I knew is that I wanted it to be big and completely out there! I needed it to be a challenge, I had to push my limits and my imagination but at the same time I wanted it to be something special to me and something that I love.
It was one evening I treated my self to some wine, put my feet up and decided to watch The Dark Knight which happens to be one of my favorite films. I was half way through the film when I was inspired, I don't know how or why but my head was exploding with ideas. I could say it was purely down to Heath Ledgers performance as the Joker but I've always been fascinated with that character, he has no boundaries and Ledgers performance inspired me so much because he portrayed the character in such a way I had never see before and if I'm perfectly honest I don't think there will be anyone else who could top his incredible performance!

At first I was just focusing my collection around the Joker but through my research and sketching process I found myself spending more time in the local comic shop, it was here that I picked up a Sirens comic when it all clicked! I couldn't do a collection based on the Joker without including his chaotic girlfriend into the mix, so I introduced Harley Quinn and boooom! I started to see clearly where I could take this collection. What I really wanted to do was incorporate fashion and costume together from a different point of view.
It's fair to say I was nervous about how my tutors would react as sometimes I felt like I was fighting a loosing battle to persuade others how or why comic and fashion could meet as equals without it looking like my collection was solely aimed at comic cons but I'm glad I stuck to my guns and saw it through to the end, the collection took a lot of work and extra hours as four out of the six outfits had some form of laser cut techniques especially "The Jokers Quinn" which is a full length a-line skirt with over 700 laser cut Joker cards.

 One of my proudest moments of the collection I think for me and House of Denham (who created the artwork) was actually going ahead with the scripted suit which I decided to call 'A Scripted Man' which is a custom made tailored suit with the The Dark Knight script by Christopher Nolan digitally printed over cotton drill.  The collection itself is based on the relationship between the two characters as well as historical references such as actual Harlequins and the costumes they had to wear, I linked the characters together through fabrics and the techniques of laser cutting which really helped to push my boundaries and limits. All in all I spent over 200 hours laser cutting and I can honestly say I it was well worth it.  I worked along side some amazing people who contributed massively to the ending of the collection such as my amazing MUA Lizzie Mazza who I have had the pleasure of working with on many occasions, I also got to work along side Ben Cope a fantastic hair stylist from the Francesco Group in Derby. A big well done and thank you to my Harley Quinns, Sianne Tudge, Sophie Kelman and Coral Bell who actually runs S!LK Model Management and not only did she model her self but also supplied my Joker, Alex Hannah. Last but not least I would like to say a huge thank you and a big well done to my amazing team of photographers and film produces Liam Enser and Ash Stanley from Artifex Studios and Victoria Denham who not ony has contributed greatly to this project through artwork and film making but she has been my rock throughout the last year and has been with me every step of the way! My team rocks I love you all, here they are hard at work in our Behind the Scenes video!

Well anyway guys, I really hope you have enjoyed reading this post and I hope even more you like the collection, please feel free to leave any feedback and comments as I would love to hear your thoughts! Until the next time amigos x

Textile Design Continued

Hello, Victoria here from House of Denham, guest blogging for Leren this week. As I'm sure you all know, at my best pal Leren Connor is at an all time busy peak. I can however assue you that her final collection for university is going to be well worth the wait and so as not to keep you on tenderhooks until then I did some snooping around today. Well here it is a sneak preview the final textile design that I did for Leren Connor's forth coming collection. It arrived yesterday so this morning I hot footed it down to Markeaton Campus to see the finished material and check out Leren as she was hard at work laser printing her newest designs on some gorgeous leather.  I was so relieved to find she was happy with it and that all of the script I sat and painstakingly typed out had come through clearly. This piece of material is destined to live out it's life as a suit, below is also a preview of the next design that is going to be lining for another suit, which is currently on it's way to the printers.  This is actually made up of small tiles of collage taken from the comic strip Leren commission from the talented illustrator Drew Askew but I'm not going to show you in detail because I don't want to spoil the surprise.

I haven't been to Markeaton Campus since I graduated nearly five years ago (I worked it out today and was staggered), so I was quite nice to check the place out. It was a newly built campus when I was there but now it seems a really well settled art, design and technology hub. I've also heard a lot about this laser cutter but never seen one in action so Leren gave me a small tour and showed me it in action. It was really quite impressive and so exiting to see all the individual aspects starting to come together. As always, I snapped a few pics of Leren at work. She went from studious verging on sullen as she carefully imput the instructions into the computer to downright giddy with excitement as it started to do it's magic.