Having reviewed all the work from this assignment, I felt that the most successful pieces were as follows:

Folding and pleating

I felt that these were the most pleasing pieces within the folding and pleating exercises. However, whilst I enjoyed making them, there are challenges in interpreting such sharply defined shapes in a texile medium such as fabric. I may need to explore stiffeners to achieve the desired results. This could perhaps be achieved by inserting boning, wiring etc., using liquid/spray stiffeners or by using interfacings/interlinings. The knitted sample would be interesting to explore further and it may be possible to use a combination of stitch patterns and knitting needle sizes to achieve greater definition.

Crumpling

Crumpling the paper before manipulating it into different structures gave it a unique texture and greatly added to the finished feel and look of the pieces. Rubbing the crumpled paper with waxes or inks before folding would be interesting.

These techniques were very well suited to interpreting natural forms such as fungi, waves, natural landscapes, bark etc. and could be readily exported into textile work.

Heating and fusing

The nuno and wetfelting samples were my preferred pieces in the heating and fusing exercises. Felt is a very versatile medium being suitable for 2-d, 3-d and sculptural pieces. It can be created soft enough to wear as delicate scarves, made sturdier for pieces such as footwear right through to being used for industrial-scale installations such as Anneke Copier’s work. It is even used for portable housing as yurts in Mongolia. There is much to be explored with colour, texture, scale and size.

Puncturing

These samples were the most successful for this exercise. I particularly liked the needlefelting piece as this offers lots of scope for development and extension into larger pieces, exploration of colour and texture.

Embossing

This was my first experience of working with texturing medium and I thoroughly enjoyed making these samples. Adding colour (Brusho powder) and using both lustre and matte medium, also experimenting with different applications (stamping, stencilling and moulding around a form) were great fun and I can see lots of potential for taking these samples further, particularly in the moulding and casting assignment (three).