Gold Work

Today I got to learn an ancient technique that I didn't think id get the privilege to learn whilst interning at hand and lock.
I got to start my own gold work piece, learning with another intern we looked at the beginners guide book that is printed for the gold work weekend classes and set about starting our own piece.

So as will all designs once it is pricked and transferred to your fabric you want to get a gold or silver pen and lightly go over your design so that you can still see your design if it takes you a few weeks to do. 

The next stage was to then transfer the design to some black felt so that you can get the correct shapes for the inner sections. These bits will be 'padded' and so once the felt is cut out then you need to neatly stitch it onto your design.

My next part of the day was helping to prep materials for the New York courses in a few weeks time. Myself and another intern made new pin cushions for pricking out designs, there needed be on for each student.  

Bits and Bobs

So one of the main reasons I enjoy my internship so much comes down to massive variety of tasks that I get to do everyday. I love going in and never knowing what I will be doing or where I will be going. It makes things a lot more exciting!!



To start off the day I finished off my stag embroidery.

Then I helped unpick a sequin design that was put on the computerised sewing machine. This was a very tricky design onto sequinned fabric that had to be backed with dissolve-able fabric as the normal backing would just tear the sequinned fabric. When unpicking I had to be careful not to create any holes or pull off any sequins. This proved very difficult as there were several sequins trashed by the force of the machines needle.

Winter embroidery

So apart from doing the odd job today was mostly spent working on my stag embroidery.

I wasn't too sure what I wanted to do and looking at the other interns designs helped and inspired me to use some of the same techniques and apply them to my stag design.

Once I had my design drawn out onto my chosen fabric which was white velour I then went to choose my threads. I wanted to combine colours and use warm winter colours along with ones that would represent a stag well. 

                        I decided to do a variety of colours of french knots and added a few clear beads to give a different texture. I love the combination of colours and I tried to use them in the rest of the stag so that my design dosnt look to fractured. 

I also wanted to incorporate a different fabric and a shine to my design, so I cut away the ears and used a golden fabric as a backing behind the ear. All I had to do then was to stitch around the ear to hold the fabric in place and stop it from fraying. 

Free Therapy

So today may not seem very much to blog about as all the staff and interns at Hand & Lock took it in turns to finish crystallising the hoodies ready to be worn by Nick Grimshaw and Rita Ora.

This turned out to be very therapeutic and relaxing to sit and apply the crystals.

Crystals galore

The start of the morning was pretty calm, I had to unpick a collar and sleeves of a customers coat ready for machine embroidery, making sure that it would sit flat on the frame.

Due to the Hand & Lock competition coming up there was even more invites to send off so we wrote them all out and sealed the envelopes ready to be sent.

I then started working on my own hand embroidery. I was able to choose my own image or design and print it onto tracing paper. The next step was to prick the outlines of my design so that when I dust the chalk over my designs the lines with be shown on my chosen fabric. All that's left is to put my fabric into a hoop and decide how I want to embroider the design.

After lunch two hoodies and bottoms came in from Adidas, which were Nick Grimshaw and Rita Ora for BBC Radio 1 Teen Awards.
The hoodies had to have the names sewn onto them and initials before being completely crystallised. We had to glue crystals around the letters of the name, hood and cuffs. With only having two heat guns another intern had to run out and buy two more so that the whole team could work together to complete the hoodies ready for Friday afternoon collection.
Going around the letters we had to take care that they all lined up and look equal, working in a team I also had to make sure that it looked like it had been done by only one person.

We all were enjoying working closely together methodically gluing crystals onto the hoodies and learning more about each other and where we are all from.

More crystallising tomorrow!

Fabric Shopping

So after spending the morning doing some computer work I was then send on a fabric swatch adventure to Berwick street sourcing cream and white silk in different textures and weights.
now in Berwick street the fabric shops are normally a bit snobby and don't give out samples or swatches, however saying I was from Hand and Lock helped here as they knew I wasn't a student taking advantage.

 

Once I had a few different samples and I ventured back to the studios to learn how to computerise monograms ready to be sewn on the computerised machine. This process involved placing singular letters into the format the client required and getting them as close to possible on the design, making sure the letters are in the correct sizing and lined up straight.
I then had to cut fabric squares for the monograms to be sewn onto. Making sure that the fabric had no crinkles or blemishes that wouldn't be stretched out, especially in the lighter fabric. They each had to have a front and back piece.

 

My last task of the day was to find the correct/ closest colour thread to the original machine sewing and finished the suit with a small dot between the monogram, by hand.

.