pOST-MORTEM
My second-year collection made to address the social issue of gun laws
The Post-Mortem Collection was my final collection during the second year of my degree. The brief for the collection was to address a current social, environmental, or political issue through design. I chose the issue of gun laws as the focus for my collection because it was both a prevalent issue at the time, as well as something I feel strongly about. I believe weapons are not a necessary part of life anymore, and strict rules and guidelines should be in place for people who want to own guns.
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The inspiration and research for this collection started at funeral traditions, which lead into research about Victorian mourning traditions. I knew I wanted to make a collection that embodied the feeling of grief while also creating some shocking contrast. The colour palette I used featured black, reds and browns because the only colours apart from black that I would need were flesh toned colours and blood reds. I wanted to create the imagery of wounds and blood splatter on the garments as a vivid reminder of the results of ineffective gun control.
The collection was a four piece range that had to feature a coat of some kind. The coat for my collection was made a wool suiting and used a 19th century method of cartridge pleating to make the side panels. The fastening used on the coat was five bullet casings that had been emptied and drilled into to create buttons. The coat was the only piece in the collection that did not have blood on it because it's design was that it was a shield for the body, hence the empty bullet shells.
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The leggings and dress both used the same method to create the blood splatter. On the black fabric I used bleach to strip the colour out in the pattern before using red dye to replace the colour. I trialled this technique on a variety of different fabrics to find the most effective way of creating the splatter. I used a cotton linen blend to make the dress and a cotton spandex for the leggings.
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The top is made from a heavy knit mesh that has a little transparency to it. For this garment I wanted to blood to appear more three-dimensional and have a more visceral feel to it, so I experimented with liquid latex to create a thick, tacky liquid that would hold it's shape while also having the sensation of congealed blood. The colour is also much darker than the other red's in the collection to appear like it is an older wound.