I got a choice of four directions to take my final project on the ND. The biggest problem with my course was how geared it was to designing womenswear; don't get me wrong, designing dresses is great fun and all that but I do love designing for men, if only for the fact I get to draw dozens and dozens of 'em all wearing cute/sexy outfits haha!! So when I saw the title 'Underwear with Knitted Accessories', I thought I'd 'rebel against the system' by twisting the project round to menswear.
Now I'm sure the obvious direction would be to have done a whole load of guys wearing boxers and scarves, but I wanted to think outside the box, especially for my final project, and do something a bit different. I looked at a whole range of under-garments throughout the last century, garments including long johns, bodystockings, union suits and thermals, as well as sportswear, nightwear and even baby clothes. From this I was inspired to produce a range of quite simple clothing men could lounge about in at home; PJs, T-shirts, dressing gowns, as well as, of course, just plain old underpants - not the sort of fashion you'd necessarily flaunt on a night out (well, I'm sure there's someone out there who would). The primary ideas were comfort and warmth. Colour also became important and I chose to be outrageous and use orange. Who'd've thought it would go from being my most hated colour to my favourite! Blue, white, grey and red were also included in the colour range which ended up kinda giving everything a 'mod' twist.
In the end, the design I chose to make up into an actual garment was that of a cross between a hooded sweater, a jumpsuit and a babygro. I made it out of sweatshirting which I dyed bright orange and put a chunky white zip all the way down the middle - something kinda sexy about a full-length zip! With the inclusion of a dropseat (or what I'd call a 'bum-flap') the whole thing seemed to have shifted from a playful adult version of a child's garment to some fetishistic pervy sex-outfit - something that everything I design seems to end up looking like. Well, at least I have a specialty! I bought some chunky wool and completed the outfit with knitted bootees and weird fingerless armwarmer-mitten-type things. 
Obviously my favourite part of the project was doing the fashion illustrations!!! To me, it's just an excuse to come up with some eye-candy, especially when I'm designing menswear. On the course we were always encouraged to push our creativity when it came to illustrations. The method I chose to use was something combining collage, a bit of watercolour, and outlining in red graphic marker. And you know what, I'm damn pleased with 'em!! They took me forever to do. The end result probably could've been done a lot quicker digitally but then there's something kinda nice about the fact they look quite smart and clean despite doing it the 'old-fashioned' way. The time spent was no great hardship considering the content; I can't tell you how turned-on I was doing some of 'em!! *so adolescent* I wanted the guys to look very masculine to kinda contradict the 'kiddie' feel of the clothing and I thought I could be a bit cheeky with some of the poses, after all I think my lecturers were starting to see the whole thing as some dirty joke anyway! I like to think that the message I left for them upon leaving was one kinda like:
Haha!! I can't tell you how proud I am of that ass! I actually did more than these four, but these are my favourites and I want to leave you begging for more haha. (yeah right :P) Hope you enjoy them, anyhow!xx
