Post Ten: Text(ile) Message

If you remember my garden post a few weeks back, then you'll remember that my dad is an upholsterer.  As such, I've been around these gorgeous, expensive fabrics my entire life.  While I've always enjoyed them, I have never really been able to appreciate them until this year, during my interaction with them and various readings required.  Maybe it's because I was, before my enlistment as a fashion student, previously uneducated in the field, and my exposure to it now has sparked my interest.
Whatever the cause, I love fabric -- patterns, weave, weight, classification, pretty much anything I can attempt to identify.  Fabric choice is usually the first thing I notice in a garment, whether I'm designing, constructing, or simply viewing it.  In Integrated Studio 1, our next project is Body As Narrative, and we're invited to use prints, so I've been looking into how prints are informed by the design and how they help to communicate the idea behind it.
So0o0o, I took a trip on down to my dad's upholstery shop, and perused his showroom.  In terms of fabric, it's pretty decked out.  There are so many different kinds that are just exciting; most have wound up in the back of my head as I'[m thinking about future and/or current designs.  
Being that there so many textiles there that it would be too overwhelming to try to absorb them all at one time, I decided to focus on a choice few.  I looked at patterned ones that made reference to nature; I chose this because I feel like, in fashion, patterns and prints are a prominent outlet for expressing nature as inspiration.  Texture is equally expressive, and the fabrics I came across in the showroom have texture up the wa-zoo.

I think this is ridiculously luxurious.  I like the way the crushed velvet's color makes the leaves look fossilized.  But rich, at the same time!  

The stylized branches are a bit of three-dimensional pizzazz.  The fabric was used on a small, simple pillow.  Because the fabric is such a loud one (meaning that it is visually potent; its texture, palette, and print make it an attention-grabber), it's used strategically.  If it were used in fashion, by me at least, it would be used sparingly -- never in too large a quantity at once or in too complicated a garment.  

The folds make it difficult to tell what's going on in the print.  It makes me want to play with prints and the effect that darts and seams have on them.  Also, the fact that this is a picture of draperies reminds of draping in fashion.  I don't know how to drape yet, but I always picture it kind of exactly like this.  Carol Burnett style.  

I know this isn't really a textile, but come on.  It's amazing.  Look at my first post, and you'l know why I love it.  But anyway, I posted this image from Alexander McQueen because I feel like it utilizes texture and materials to communicate the ideas behind the piece.  

What struck me about this image from an Oscar De La Renta show was the 3D pizzazz element!  I think some of the roses are 3D pizzazz.  I think the cleanness of the overall print and its classic subject matter allow for the success of the 3D pizzazz element.