V&A Experience|80's Day Experience

V&A Evaluation

On the 5th of November me and my Graphics Design class went on a trip to the V&A in London which was a provocative experience which helped me gain great knowledge about the 80's. 

We first started off touring the V&A taking in the superior atmosphere admiring all that there was too see. There was a number of floors with vast amount of cabinates on each with unique objects inside them. I took a lot of images of the atmosphere and the objects being shown in these cabinates as i felt this could later help when it comes to the design stage. I felt that walking around the V&A was an incredible experience as there was so much things to see that really looked amazing as they were different, creative and unique.

We then went to the 80's section and took in all there was too see while taking pictures. The 80's section was bright and also creative with different designs from furnature to posters, they all looked immense. This stage i felt helped me gain a better experience on the 80's as i got a real feel of what some of the styles and colours that were used in that stage of time.

After looking at this section we then had an exibition to attend to. We had to go round taking in and writing notes about the fashion designers. This gave me a deeper insight on the 80's fashion design industry. There were many big glass enclosures with two bright colours in each as the background. Inside them there were many creative fashion designs and brochures from famous fashion designers which gave me a better feel of the colours and quirky styles used in the 80's which really could help when choosing the colour scheme for my type or my background on my poster. The one fashion designer that stood out to me was Michiko Koshino. Mainly because it was the first enclosure but not only that, the sportswear clothing Michikio Koshino made was very interesting and creative. His oversized trainers were different which really gave me an idea for design while i was there.

Overall i felt that this was a great experience which i really enjoyed. This part of research will help a great deal as i learned a lot about the 80's which really is going to help when it comes to the design stage of this project.

80's Day Evaluation

After an interesting day of getting the 80's feel i had a great time learning new things and also experienced a different way of learning which i felt was great and helpful as it really can inspire me towards my idea's and final outcome.

Firstly we all seporated into groups and had to decide on a theme which relates to the 80's. My group had the topic politics which we felt was a difficult one as it was hard to add expressive creativity in our work however i really did learn a few aspects from this topic such as how it came around and some of the main slogans that were used and who they were created by. After picking our theme we then looked into famous political slogans that could be painted on our 5 white wooden boards. We found a few but the ones we liked most were from an English fashion designer best known for her political t-shirts called Katharine Hamnett. We chose the slogans Peace, Education Not Missiles, Use a Condom,  Save The Future and Choose Life to paint on our 5 white wooden boards. This step i felt was facinating and easy as i was learning new things about the 80's and they all related well with our theme. 

We then went onto painting these slogans on our 5 white painted boards in the colours black and red as these colours relate to Katharine Hamnett's famous designs. I felt that this process was great fun as it was a different way of working to how we normally work which i felt was a interesting experience.

After painting our boards we then had to pick some music that closely related to our political slogans which we was going to play in our final presentation. We looked at a few artists and their songs such as Nena-99 Red Balloons, The Specials-Too Much Too Young, Bon Jovi - Livin' On A Prayer and Kate Bush - Army Dreamers. This stage was an interesting and diverse process as i listened to music that i have never heard before, although i dident like the music i got a real feel of the style of how 80's music really was. After listening to these songs we chose to use Bon Jovi - Livin' On A Prayer as it had a real kick to it and also related to our painted boards. 

After picking our piece of music for our final presentation we had to come up with a creative routine to present our final pieces of work to the tutors and our felow class mates. We chose to walk in slowely like robots, place our boards down while shouting them out, then ending it by praying which relates with the song we chose and also has a purpose because of the meaningful slogans on our boards. I felt that this presentation wasnt very creative nor expressive however it linked with our designs, music and also went well.

Overall the 80's day was an outstanding experience  as it gave me different insperations as i got to see other classmates presentations which really gave me great ideas that can be used for further development. I also learnt a lot about the 80's which gave me a better insite when it comes to the deisgn stage.