​I don’t think I have ever cried so much about embroidery before, I spent 5 hours last night doing a hand embroidery of spoons making up a tartan all out of metallic thread on dissolvable fabric only for it all to fall apart when I dissolved the fabric. Now I really have nothing to show for my hard work, I feel so stupid for not taking pictures of my final piece before putting it in the water but I was just so excited to be done and to see the final piece.
When we were at uni I made the group presentation and offered to lead the presentation as I knew nobody wanted to do this and I felt like I had really let the team down, it's been a really tough few weeks so this really did just top it all off.
I am really proud of our group though as we only had 4 members at the end which had made it quite difficult to create a final piece as there wasn’t enough of us. But I am also proud of myself for standing up in front of everyone and talking, the one thing that scares me almost as much as snakes!

​Todays tutorial was quite hard, although it was hearing everything I needed to it was just quite a lot, I hadn’t had the best Easter with quite a lot of personal things happening at home and so I had begun to panic about my work and just tried to get as much done as possible but it was like I had taken a step back with the quality, so I am very pleased that sue pulled me out on it and helped me to get back on track, after speaking to her I am feeling a lot happier with the direction I am going in, after my tutorial I went to go and get some more fabric samples so that I could begin to play around with them on the mannequin. When I got back sue worked with me until we had a good concept for the final design, one I am very proud of and can't wait to submit. 

Today was spent trying to finish all of my work for the bridal buyers award, I have spent a lot of time on this and I am really happy with my end results, I have decided to do digital designs as I feel that they look more professional and also show off the fabrics in the best way.

With my work deleting its self this morning it really did break me as I had stayed up till 3.30 am working on it to make sure that it was the best I could possible produce so to see it all disappear right before my eyes was really hard but After a lot of stress I finally go my work sent off. NEVER FORGET TO SAVE YOUR WORK AS YOU GO ALONG!!!!!!! But its all over now and I am really happy with the work that I actually sent off.
I ended up using my final fabric to create the skirt on the dress as I felt that it really lifted the illustration. Now that it all done I can focus on the Givenchy brief as I still have a lot of work to do for that.

Todays tutorial went really well, my tutor gave me lots of ideas about how to improve my portfolio and also answered all our questions about what should be included and what should be avoided in our portfolios. I had been really panicking that I was getting behind but today helped me a lot as I now feel a lot more on top of everything, it also helped seeing how much everyone else had completed. With one week to go until hand in I am feeling a lot more confident and happy with my work, especially now I have finished all of the bridal work.

I hate to be this person but I really don’t like this collaboration project, I don’t mind the collaboration side I think that is going to be interesting and hopefully I will learn some new skills and my groups seem really motivated. I just really don’t like the actual brief, I feel like it is glamorising human trafficking, and as we don’t know what people might have been through I am finding it morally difficult. I understand that we are trying to raise awareness but I don’t think that is how it is going to come across, I am going to put a lot of hard work into this project so that we can create something that I am proud of, but for now I am finding it a very difficult topic to research and then try and design anything around.

Todays tutorial went really well I was a bit panicked as I didn’t have a lot of work as we had no internet at home and I had to stay in waiting for the engineer to come but I took some books out of the library yesterday about metal embroidery which were really interesting and I think will help us with this project. In the tutorial we all discussed our ideas and then our tutor gave her opinions on all our ideas and helped bounce ideas around, I came away feeling really motivated which Is what I needed after yesterday, after the tutorial we split off and I went to go and buy some spoons so that I can begin my experimentation.

Todays group tutorial went really well and I am really happy with all the comments I got and also how many helpful comments of improvement I got, I now know exactly where I am going with the projects, which is good as I have been really struggling recently. As not many people showed up to the tutorials we each got a longer slot which was really helpful especially before we go away for 3 weeks for Easter, it really helped make sure that we were on track and motivated as well as making sure we were going down a good path that will work. I am now feeling a lot more confident and happy with the work that I have produced over the past few weeks. 

​Todays tutorial was really helpful, we talked through my work for the bridal buyers award and discussed what I should do next. I am really happy with the progress I have made this week as I feel that I have tried a lot to focus on my drawings. I struggle with my drawings as I feel that they never fully capture what I am trying to portray,  but I feel that these have really progressed over the past few days, so I am going to continue to practice so that I can keep improving.
Over the next few days I will work on developing fabric samples for this competition, as I have found a fabric I really like but it is out of my price range but I am going to do experiments so that I can create my own that has the same effect just cheaper!

​Today we had a group tutorial with one of our tutors, this was a really good session to make sure that we were all on the write page and on track. It was really good to hear lots of peoples opinions on my work, giving me lots I can work on until my next tutorial. I feel I am getting a lot better at tutorials and I feel a lot more confident presenting my work which is helping me be able to convey my ideas a lot clearer.

Today I spoke to my tutor for the first time about the bridal buyers award, this was a really good chance to just discuss all of my ideas, I am really excited about this competition as it gives me a chance to fully explore the bridal industry.
We discussed a lot of different ideas from where I can begin to explore, the things that stuck with me were looking at the heritage of bridal wear in my family and also butterflies all of which will work alongside the Old Hollywood Glamour theme that they have 

​Today we had interchange, I signed up for the business session as I thought this would be very beneficial in the long run with my plan for setting up my business. This was a really good session and a lot of fun and it got us to really think about different business ideas but also how to sell the ideas to people, making them want to own our product. We learnt all about pitching and then had to pitch the ideas that  we had come up with to the whole of the careers team dragons den style, this was a really good way for us to be able to learn the good ways of pitching. The whole session really got us thinking about how we sell ourselves to others and about how you should talk for less but have quality to your words. Overall this session was a really good experience and I know that I will retain all the information that I learnt.

Today I was in London, this was a really good day as I got to see and do a lot. We started at the fabric forum, this was a really good way to see a lot of different fabric suppliers and to see what they all have on offer thinking about my third year collection, I now have a long list of suppliers that I can check out nearer the time. We then went to the V&A where we had a good look round, this was helpful as I had been really struggling to come up with a theme but looking around allowed me to become really inspired. We then went to the natural history museum which much like the V&A helped to inspire me.

This morning we had an advanced photoshop session with another one of our tutors, this was really helpful as it gave us a chance to talk about our work with another tutor, getting another pair of eyes and another opinion, when we were discussing what I was doing at the moment we came up with lots of ideas of things that I can do to help improve all of my work. Then in the afternoon we had a session for our research reports, this was an interesting session as it got us to think about our sources and how reliable they are, we had to create a sea creature that we felt summarised the source and then decide where in the sea you would find it, on the surface were magazine like sources that weren’t very in depth or academic and then near the bottom were journals and academic writing, this helped me to understand how important sources are for backing up your opinion and work. Although the session was slightly mad and odd! It was really helpful and by the end it all made sense.

Todays tutorial was quite hard, I had really tried this week but had been struggling with the projects and the tutorial just confirmed that, I will take this next week to develop my ideas and perhaps change the projects I am doing so that they fit my aesthetic a lot better. Although I had a lot of helpful advice I still feel stuck with what I am doing, the main thing that I took away from the session is that I need more drawing, this is something I am going to have to work on.

​This morning we had the briefing for BA2B, this is quite a lot to take in! there are quite a few different sections to this unit, which is making me very excited to start but I also know that I need to be very on top of my time management to make sure that I get it all done. I am not sure how I feel about the collaboration project but I will wait until we start that to make my judgements, for now I will work on the other projects.
We also had a library session today about paraphrasing, I found this a good session as I learnt more about how to paraphrase and how to use it to the best of my advantage. I also enjoyed playing with the LEGO!
Todays lecture was the last of the business start up lectures, these have been really helpful and very informative, as I want to set up my own business once I graduate these sessions have been very beneficial. They have been really interactive and allowed us to be creative in a different way to our courses.

The past two days I have spent doing research and deciding on which competitions I want to work on, I have decided the YKK brief looking at millinery inspired by industrial works and then the Clarks brief designing bridal shoes, I will talk to my tutor on Friday and see what she thinks and then I will be straight onto the rest of the work.

Todays session on our research reports was really helpful we had both our essay tutor and textiles tutor going through everything with us for our research report proposals and answering any questions that we had. They then came round and saw is in small groups to discuss what we thought we would be writing our reports on. I have decided to write mine all about sustainability throughout the bridal industry, as this is the route I plan to take in my future I feel that this will be the most valuable topic for me to cover as well as being one that I will enjoy researching and furthering my understanding of. Over the next few weeks I will begin my research and begin writing my research report proposal ready for hand in.

Todays individual tutorial was interesting, we mostly just talked about the last unit and then also discussed the courses I am hoping to take part in the summer which was really helpful but we also talked about third year after I said that I wanted to do a sustainable bridal collection, I was then recommended that I don’t do a complete bridal collection instead focus on bridal competitions and do something else as my collection, this was really hard to hear as I know that the wedding industry is going to be where I end up and want to spend my time focusing and exploring the bridal industry and gaining new skills, but at the same time I know that the advice was given for a reason, so I will have to think about this a lot and decide the route I want to go with my graduate collection but for now I need to focus on completing year 2!

​Overall, this unit has really challenged me and I am really happy with my final outcomes especially for tailoring. I feel that I have really pushed the boundaries of my comfort zones to produce the best work that I can. ​