Sunday 22 July 2012

Olympic Torch Relay- Bournemouth

Back in March in I did a favor for my dancing teacher and made him some contemporary circle skirts for his piece with Pavilion Dance Adult Contemporary Company. When it came to April I found a spare hour to visit Pavilion Dance to give back left over fabric and collect portfolio photos. On the spot I was asked what I was doing in July. At that point I knew I would have graduated and had one month left on my contract in my student house so I said not much. "How would you like to costume a load of break dancers for the Olympic Torch Relay?" was the next question..... There was no way I was going to say no.

Organised by Activate Performing Arts, Pavilion Dance South West and choreographed by Avant Garde, the initial idea was that the dancers were athletes (but with a little break dancing gear feel) at the Olympics and the dance piece would be a journey from the opening ceremony, to the games to the closing ceremony.
My main source of inspiration came from Olympic athlete's track suit uniform and the Olympic ring colours: blue, black, red, yellow and green. I had originally intended to put the dancers in white tracksuits and dip dye parts of the tracksuits, but due to budget and the amount of dancers it wasn't possible. My idea had to change. I decided that the initial uniform would be to keep the white tracksuit bottoms and for break dancing street credibility, have black vest tops with some form of a logo at the front with a athlete race number at the back to keep them unified. Sounds easy doesn't it?.... It really wasn't. This was the first project where I was sourcing clothes rather than fabric. I found it a really hard task to search for garments that were perfect and were in budget range. Especially white tracksuit bottoms. It sounded like a bog standard colour to get and yet very few retailers and wholesalers sold them! Fortunately, thanks to some deep searching on ebay and very close to fitting day I found a wholesale retailer who I was able to strike a deal to send me samples to fit the dancers on time.

After some careful decision making and planning all the tracksuit bottoms were divided into equal colour groups. and their began the dip dying saga. My advice to anyone who is going to do dip dying at home is to make sure you have a decent size kitchen to rinse clothes.

 Space for a washing up bowl to have hand dye in, cupboards to hang clothes off of whilst in the dying process. 

And another space to hang clothes to dry. Unfortunately my house didn't have the space for this but fortunately two fellow costumiers' flat/house did! Thank you Helen and Hanah!

Next were the tops. A new thing I learnt. It is easy to get plain black vest tops for adults.... but for some reason they don't exist in any children's wear. However plain white vest tops do.  At this point I was prepared to try to dye them all black but then the Choreographer requested for them not to be black before I bought the dye. I was very happy to have that problem solved.

The design for the tops was inspired by a relay race track, particularly when it curves round. To abstract the design the five colours were incorporated into the design. As I was free hand painting the design I needed to make the lines as sleek as possible.

A stencil, made out of card board, was made to help with the sleekness but also to keep each line roughly the same distance apart for every single top

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As for the numbers.... well there's not much to say about them other than I'm so glad I discovered transfer paper when I did the sweet tutu project. That method came in handy once again.


Final Photos 

 These professional photos were taken by Jerry Fenner. Check out his blog! Theres a lot more photos on his site! http://jerryfennerphotography.co.uk/bournemouth-wedding-photographer-4/ 


Also check out Activate Performing Arts to see what other dance and theatre events are happening near you.  http://activateperformingarts.org.uk/

Last advert (I promise!) before I leave you to look at the photos. Thank you Pavilion Dance for giving me this opportunity. It was an absolute pleasure working with you again. To see what dance performances are happening in Bournemouth, or your interested in picking up a few new dance moves check this website out http://www.paviliondance.org.uk/

Okay I'm done now. Enjoy the pictures!





Thursday 19 July 2012

Just a quick update

So I've successfully graduated from my degree course at the Arts University College at Bournemouth with Costume with Performance Design and have now entered the real world. After the insane year I've had with the medieval period, a dissertation and mixing sweets with ballet... real life does sound like sanctuary.

So what can you expect next? Well my biggest news that has just passed is that I have completed my first official job as a costume designer and supervisor for Pavilion Dance South West. I worked with four local break dancing crews and a professional break dancing crew from London for the Olympic Torch Relay in Bournemouth. And guess what.... a little bit of our performance made it on the BBC! I'm awaiting some professional photos and I've been given permission to write a post about my costume journey so watch this space! This post is coming very soon!

My next project will be starting in August where I am Wardrobe Mistress for the Orchard Theatre's Summer Youth Project "Annie" in Dartford. 10 days to costume 175 kids... challenge accepted.

After that... I am not sure what is happening next. However, I still have quite a few custom makes that I ow a couple of people. I haven't forgotten about any of you.... promise! This next stepping stone in my life is very exciting and yet slightly scary at the same time. Bring on the professional madness!