.. as wonderfully displayed at the William Morris Museum exhibition, Walthamstow, London,
retracing 150 years of Liberty London British Women textile print artists
such as Althea McNish, a Tottenham local artist sharing her beautiful creations,
Yet not quite covering the whole spectrum... hiding the crafter team behind the dress without which the fabric or dress would not come to life or be in a relationship...
As the Poppy dress was developed and shaped with several sessions of draping converted to paper patterns and toiles ready for production, in a North London Boutique factory
it was a true surprise to find the dress , unannounced, only to discover it was made in Italy, not London, where it was thought to be following development.
It helps creative teams to follow up with production, as development is the time consuming stage and the reward of looping the whole process into small scale production is key to continue creative expression and keep the industry alive locally for more new designers to be able to emerge..
another surprise was to discover a day later that McNish designs at Liberty were only reduced to one, and also printed in Italy...
What happened to the original British printing workshops?
What happened to finding more of her original prints?
and what happened to acknowledging all women involved in the creation of the dress?
When the pattern was created a few ideas were implemented in order to make the style work:
for instance the raglan sleeve in order to limit the gathers on the shoulder that were making the cap sleeve fly up...
art happens at all level of the designing processes, from the print to the sketch, to the 3D cloth rendering and final constructions... all participants deserve mentioning.
In a strange twist both the dress crafters and Althea's prints kind of vanished
Althea wonderful prints could come in more utilitarian fabrics, to satisfy a hungry designer sphere of artists who like to design and shape as mush as make...
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