Final year project
La Pachamama [Read more]
La Pachamama
La Pachamama, is a goddess celebrated by indigenous people in the Andes. Stretching to people in Columbia, Chile, Ecuador, Bolivia, Peru, Venezuela and Argentina.
Pachamama is known as mother earth who presides over planting, harvesting, mountains, fertility and causes any natural phenomenon such as earthquakes.
Pachamama is an independent deity who has her own ability and creative power to sustain life on earth.
This Peruvian deity was spoken of whilst Lauren embarked on a six-day trek to Machu Picchu. Lauren wanted to create a print to represent the landscapes of the land La Pachamama resides over and created this half drop digital design to embody the essence of the mountains whilst encompassing the traditional colours of Peru.
Paintings and Development Work
Lauren created paintings using a broad spectrum of colours, inspired by Peruvian textiles, to investigate the mountainous landscapes. Looking to combine these elements to create abstract, original and contemporary design compositions.
Mesa de Hojas de Coca and Santuario de Machu Picchu
'Mesa de hojas de Coca' and 'Santuario de Machu Picchu' are two tabletop designs made from plywood with pigment paste, screen printed surfaces.
The tables are laser cut to be specific shapes designed by Lauren. One tabletop design is inspired by the shapes made from a Coca leave ritual carried out by Humantay Lake whilst on the Salkantay Trek. The other tabletop design is inspired by Machu Picchu directly, showcasing the mountains identifiable shape.
The landscape design on both of the tabletops is a nine layered registered pigment print using a similar colour palette.
Cusco
'Cusco' is a half drop registered repeat which is printed onto heavyweight organza with a hand-dyed ombré. This design originated from detailed fine-liner drawings which focused on the shapes and layers of the houses. The print captures the essence of Cusco town with its recognisable stacks of houses weaving up and around the valley.
Cusco's shadows upon La Pachamama
This image displays the aspects of how hand and digitally printed fabrics can work together to create new and interesting surfaces. The shadows created from the 'Cusco' print fall upon the 'La Pachamama' design to create new proportions and colour compositions. Showcasing how the city of Cusco and its surrounding landscapes and deity are all linked and work in harmony.
Chakana
'Chakana' focuses on the Chakana symbol which is a stepped cross which is important to Inca culture and is recognised in Peru.
Each step of the symbol has a meaning and represents a feeling/belief.
Upper Left Quadrant: Love, Trust, Connections
Lower Left Quadrant: Acknowledgement, Protection, Awareness
Lower Right Quadrant: Happiness, Passion, Expression
Upper Right Quadrant: Responsibility, Productivity, Present
This is a symbol which was present in many aspects of Lauren's trip to Peru. It was engraved into Machu Picchu's stones, on church buildings in Cusco and Ica and also sold in markets as a jewellery motif. Such an important and symbolic motif needed to be featured in this collection which encompasses Peru.
Caminos Rocosos
'Caminos Rocosos' is a digitally rendered design which focuses on the stones which filled the valleys leading to Machu Picchu. Thoughts of the Inca Empire taking the same paths and witnessing the same valleys filled with stones, rocks and harsh terrain provided the inspiration for this design. Focus on traditional Peruvian colours and the bright colour contrast completed this print.
Rayas y bandas
'Rayas y bandas' is a coordinated design, created to link the colours used across the collection into a design for reflection. Each stripe contains a digitally rendered wave to create the effect of a woven structure such as the Peruvian crafts and textiles. However, creating a version digitally helps to bring traditional and modern methods together to move towards contemporary and innovative design intended for the current market.
Lauren Brigden
Lauren is a personable, confident, passionate, enthusiastic, detail-focused and highly motivated graduate who specialises in printed textile design. Her final major project illustrates her passion for creating bold, maximalist and contemporary designs which combine her love of travelling and experiencing different cultures into colourful, textural and abstract based patterns. The collection is intended for domestic interior spaces which are in need of a burst of colour, pattern and an eye-catching bespoke piece.
Lauren’s final collection, ‘La Pachamama’ is an interior project that celebrates Peru and its landscape, textiles, culture and Inca stories and traditions. Lauren adores the freedom, culture and new experiences which travel generates and wants to utilise this in her design work, creating an interior collection which provides escapism and transports others to different cultures, countries and landscapes.
A two-week trip to Peru, travelling through Cusco, the city of Ica, the Andes mountains, completing a six-day Salkantay Trek and visiting the oasis town of Huacachina all inform the imagery, shapes and patterns across the collection. Lauren drew inspiration from all aspects of her trip, completely immersing herself into the traditional Peruvian culture, landscape, textures, colours, crafts, rituals and architecture to collate a collection which entirely captures her time spent in Peru.
Lauren enjoys all aspects of the design process and particularly savours the initial investigations using photography. Capturing every aspect of her experience and developing them into print ideas. Adopting various mediums to create drawings and paintings to explore the photographs and research in a versatile manner is another skill of hers.
Lauren prides herself on working to a high standard especially with her CAD skills, reworking and creating new designs in various original ways. Hand painting and drawing at a high level with an innovative and original eye, are other significant skills of Lauren. She is always looking to develop these skills, whilst ensuring she has a portfolio containing a wide range of styles and designs to keep her work fresh, current, contemporary and on-trend.
Lauren wishes to continue developing and succeeding within the textiles industry, pursuing a career in print design in either fashion or interiors as her style, experience and skills are versatile and applicable for both. Lauren’s work experience has equipped her with strong problem-solving skills, the ability to work well under pressure, providing her own original thoughts and presenting them to teams and working ahead of deadlines. All these qualities present her to be a promising designer with a strong desire to grow, learn, work hard and engage highly in a future print role.
Final year project
La Pachamama
Awards
'21 Diploma in Professional Studies
'19-'20 Original designs sold online and in store for H&M
'19-'20 Fabric choices approved for garments sold online and in store at M&S
Work Experience
October 2019-June 2020
Lauren completed a nine-month placement with M&S Womenswear based in their head office in London. Lauren worked as an assistant to a Senior Fabric Sourcer, learning the role thoroughly, with her main responsibilities being to create, maintain, and manage online fabric trackers for the two main core ‘money making’ departments at M&S Womenswear. These were; Formal Bottoms & Tailoring, and Casual Bottoms & Denim.
The trackers were vitally important for the organisation and the planning of each season for each department as they noted the technical information for each fabric and its colouration, print design and quantities of each order.
Further from this, it was Lauren’s responsibility to manage the fabrics, chase global mills to ensure their arrival to meet M&S’ internal deadlines and to build good working relationships with these mills, to maintain the fabric library, ensuring it was always tidy and organised in the best way to promote an inspiring space and to attend team meetings and pitch new ideas and fabric choices.
Lauren developed her confidence and communication skills at M&S through consistent pitching of ideas in team meetings and clarifying and resolving of any issues concerning fabrics and finding appropriate solutions.
During Lauren’s time at M&S she also learnt the role of the product designers and fabric technicians too, as she worked closely with them each day and further spent a few days shadowing each to gain experience with both, to develop her understanding and learning further.
Lauren adapted to working from home for the last four months of her M&S placement, learning how to use online communication software and developing her skills to still work effectively when apart. Lauren used this time to also develop her trend forecasting skills and to create reports which benefitted M&S design teams with future season designing.
June 2019 to August 2019.
Lauren gained a three-month placement with H&M based in their head office in Stockholm, Sweden. She was an assistant to the two Print Designers, covering Boys Accessories which focused on designing Sportswear, Fancy Dress items, Swimwear, Hats, Gloves and other accessories for boys aged 18 months to 10 years old.
Lauren’s main responsibilities were to carry out thorough trend research appropriate for the target customer, create drawings and original concepts for popular designs and adapt and re-format designs ready for mass production.
Lauren researched new trends specific for the target audience, looking at competitors and what they were offering in comparison to H&M and also looking at anything new and upcoming in the entertainment & music industries to see what would appeal to Boys. Lauren often worked with License imagery, looking for original content to use and create designs for future garment designs appropriate for H&M’s focussed season and department.
Lauren’s other responsibilities were to format designs to the highest accuracy for mass production, ensuring that these were correct to H&M production roller sizes and to H&M’s in house colour standard system.
Creating original drawings and colour work for print designs, specifically looking at beach themed prints and graphic style glitch and gradient digital colour work. Attending regular design meetings for the print design team and for the whole department, developing her ability to communicate ideas and designs in a positive and informed manner to enable an optimistic outcome for design approval. Whilst with H&M, Lauren also received formal Adobe Illustrator and Photoshop courses as well as a sustainable fashion course.
Lauren’s designs were approved for global sale at H&M and they sold out on their online stores.