Erickson Beamon

Jewellery designer, frequent collaborator with Alexander McQueen. Pushing the boundaries of pearls, crystals and chains creating chandeliers, masks and headpieces. Such a fairy tale element in all of their designs.

                                                              "Dreams are made of this"-
                                                    Jefferson Hack for Dazed and Confused

Materials

It's the start of the last project of uni life...I am slightly terrified. To ease my panic I've decided to keep busy by heading out to source materials. I decided to buy 4oz wadding because my intention is to make a lamp and a parasol so I don't want the quilting to look too heavy. I also picked up some different weights of plain cotton to experiment with in terms or weights.

My best finds were in a charity shop as usual, some teeny weeny brass chairs and a teapot, some vintage pearls, satin and a pre-embroidered table cloth. I'm excited about what I can use these for...watch this space!

Development, context and relationships....and an Indian wedding!

I originally did this Swan painting onto vintage wallpaper with raised textures. I always seem to choose a texture to work into because it makes it far less daunting than to work onto a flat white surface.  I have also been working into rolls of canvas a lot and this is something I want to continue to develop.

I am inspired by the work of Rob Ryan and traditional paper cutting so I thought I would experiment with my love of layering and multimedia through the use of cutting paper away.  I have used vintage imagery collected from vintage shops along with old book pages to create a peep-through aspect. It also adds a different dimension when you look at image and spot something new each time.  I enjoyed the cutting out of the original textures found on the paper and incorporating them with the overall image.

 

I was thinking a lot about context when creating this piece. I really like it just as a piece of art. I feel it would be beautiful as a super sized wall mural. I also want to develop the swan theme, I could imagine using a two swans as bespoke wings or a mask/ collar/ head dress. I can see a strong relationship developing between my drawings and my sampling. Literal thing such as the black dots and gold dots relate to circular stitches and sequins and beads.

I went to and Indian wedding in the summer and was memorised by the details of the saris alongside the encrusted embroidery. I think this has really influenced by drawing style of late. I like to make my imagery up of tiny dots and metallic that shimmer. I can also see that the bright colours of the saris tie very much in with my own work...

Mrs Lily; Sampling, context and development

I made Mrs Lily as a direct result of my second tutorial with Louise Richardson. I have had some of my drawings printed on the sublimation printer and wanted to pad them and bring them 'to life' with embellishments, hand and machine embroidery. I bought a variety of needles for my Janome Harmony 2041 including thin needles for polyesters and synthetics (sublimation materials), quilting needles and metallic thread embroidery needles.

To create Mrs Lily I used polyester sourced from an old shirt in a charity shop and backed it onto a piece of cotton found fabric. I love the idea of utilising unwanted materials. I then highlighted my drawing with a straight black stitch. I did struggle to actually quilt the bird because I need to reach a compromise between using freehand and a structured stitch with a normal foot/ quilting foot.

I left loose threads on my embellishments because of the trend research on WGSN 'Archaic Threads'. I think it added charm to Mrs Lily. I also experimented with embroidery silks (2 strand and 4 strand) to create varying sizes of French knotting building up textures in different colours. This creates a more textured base to then embellish, representing a hint of the animals genuine appearance (wings). My sequins are sourced from www.josyrose.com because the sequins seem so much stronger and symmetrical than others I have used. I would like to try and source some sort of vintage beading to use in partnership with the sequins in the future.

 

 

I love that drawing onto a magazine page means that there is this little face peeking through although I would have to be careful with doing this with illustrations because obviously that little face is someone else's work.

I still really want to take this peeping idea forwards using vintage imagery from photographs I sourced over the summer.

Context

I'm finding myself getting really excited about the work I am producing. I can imagine this bird a bit flatter as part of a collar as a shoulder on a dress. Swans on the side of shoes, embroidered animals wrapped round necks and lamps and cushions ahhhhhhhh the possibilities of accessories!!! I also think my drawings have the potential to be developed into transfers for ceramics, simple wallpaper repeats and quirky giftwear/ stationary/ fine art dolls and childrenswear. Why pen myself in to fashion or interiors or art when I can and want to do all three?

Work Placement continued...

This week I have been dealing with the Star Wars exhibition. Sitting in whilst people look round, talking to the public. Whilst doing that I have been continuing work on the favours for the Surrealist Soirée. Finger knitting with wire has been fun, results below!