This design was originally meant to be developed from my first mirrored repeat; however, i got so carried away with experimenting and manipulating it, it has become a design of its own. I really like the idea of a mirrored circular structure as i feel it resembles a floral shape made of smaller alien florals.

The first step i took to create this design was to reduce the scale of some of the florals. Within my previous design i felt they appeared to be too tightly packed, so wanted to allow more negative space between them. However, the reason this pattern became its own and not necessarily a development of the previous was because this totally changed the motif shape and how they could interlock into a repeating structure.

Once happy with this motif and feeling it reflected nicely i then went about repeating it into a repeating structure. Because of the new angular edges of the repeat this now lent its self to a diamond structure. Once copying and pasting the motif down the page i realised the border along the top actually looked quite elegant without the design needing to cover the entire page. Instantly i felt this would make a great design for bedding as i could imagine this on a duvet cover where it comes to a staggered edge near the top.

Once happy with the repeating structure i then went about experimenting with backgrounds much like i did within my previous design. Once again i feel a white background looks a lot more elegant as the hues within the design and the form of the aliens is a lot clearer. I feel a background hue is not working so well on these designs as there is already so many hues within the motifs already present. When i come around to developing my background designs a coloured background may be a lot more appropriate.

Overall i really like this design and definitely want this to have a place within my collection as a bedding design. To develop this onto pillows i could use a single line of the motif, or one single motif.

After reflecting on this design and realising i will need a seprate design for a pillow i have decided to create one so when it comes to printing my designs i have everything i need. For this i decided to use a strip of the motif as i felt this would work the best due to the rectangular shape of pillow cases. Now creating this design i think it would also work really well as a dado rail so the bedding could be matching the walls. A dado rail is something i have fond memories of in my room as a child and would allow customers a choice to have some pattern on their walls without having to wallpaper the entire surface area.

Recently i have found there has been a lot of confusion within my project from tutors which has sent me into a bit of a spin. Although putting my aliens into little stories seemed like a nice idea at first, with only four weeks left of the project the idea of having to come up with story lines and creating more imagery was making me question how i am going to get this done in four weeks. Having to come up with 30 designs, create product mock ups, alternate colour ways, getting my designs printed, hemmed and bound on top of this just seemed like an unrealistic amount of work. Although i do appreciate we also have three weeks of easter i do not want to set the end of easter as my deadline as i want to leave time for anything to go wrong.

After talking to my mentor about this situation i feel the idea of adding these story lines is a whole different project from my own and does not reflect where my ideas initially came from. Instead of putting this massive pressure on myself i have decided for now to stick with my original ideas and then if i have time i can develop them in light of the tutors ideas. Once making this decision i felt so much better about my project and felt a lot more confident which is a good reflection that this is the right decision.

One idea i have had visualised in my head is my aliens in a mirrored circular structure so this is where i decided to start. I selected two similar but different aliens and arranged them into a 90 degree rotation motif. It took some time to make them equally spaced so none of the petals were overlapping; however, when i did manage this i was happy with the result.

Following this i started by aranging this motif in a block repeat. I really like the contrast between the pink petal rings and the limb structure which contains more negative space. Despite being happy with this progress i felt there was too much negative space between each ring so decided to add in another reflected alien.

I selected this yellow alien to break up the pink petals so there was a small amount of contrast between the hues. Initially i added this alien at a fairly large scale; however, found the eyes of this alien were too close together. Although i found this had a certain charm within its self, as i created each element i understand its structure; however, the customer/ viewer will not see this so clearly.

Instead i made this yellow alien slightly smaller in scale and rotated it throughout the repeat. I think this yellow alien really helps to break up the pink hues and fills some of the negative space.

Following with this i experimented with all the hues from my colour pallet to try and find an appropriate background shade. Overall despite thinking the light pink works well i feel a white background is the strongest as it really helps the hues to stand out. Despite being happy with the progress i had made, especially considering this was my first design; i felt the pink florals were too tightly packed so decided to develop this idea into my second pattern. However, now this new pattern is so different from this original i feel i could still return to this and develop it further. For reference for myself later i have created the bellow bullet point list of things i would like to manipulate:

• Rotate entire pattern 45 degrees so creates a diamond/ diagonal formation.
• Reduce size of pink florals (experiment with scale)
• Use all brown or green aliens for central motif and create a second out of the other hue.
• Experiment with new repeating structures e.g. a brick repeat.

From here i have already developed my next pattern which will be annotated in a new post to keep things organised. After experimenting with the ideas in my head i will return back to this pattern and develop it in relation to the points on my list.

Today i went back to the stitch room in the hope to develop my ruffler samples further. For this i went to Cardiff market and bought a range of different ribbons which were of a wider width than those i was originally experimenting with. Unfortunately not all of these were available in my colour pallet so i got those that i felt best related in hue or tone. If i had found a ribbon which i particularly liked the width, thickness or effect of i would have looked online to find this in the hue of my colour pallet.

Unfortunately when Maggie got the foot out she informed me that only one setting was working so i did not get to experiment with the full range of stitches available. It would have been useful to have been told this when enquiring about coming to the stitch room as i could have waited until the new foot came in.

Throughout these different types of ribbon i had varying amounts of success. I found the widest ribbon was in fact too wide for the machine to handle. This was unfortunate as when it did work for small runs at a time i really like the frilly textures it creates. Fortunately i had much greater luck with my second ribbon. As this was so light weight it creates a really nice ruffled effect which i feel really works.

In contrast to this the third ribbon was much too thick for the machine to handle so i only managed to get a small sample of this done. Not wanting to break the machine i decided not to experiment with the other ribbons i had bought (photographed bellow).

Despite really liking some of the samples i have produced when experimenting, i will not be including it within my collection. I would hate to base one of my designs around this stitch and then find out that the foot is broken. As well as this, waiting for Maggie to set up the machine (despite saying i could do it myself) is awfully time consuming and i feel i can produce a much greater quantity and quality of work working by myself. I feel at this stage i need to be working in a really professional and time effective manor and the best way about this is not relying on other people.

Before my tutorial with Sian i was conscious i needed to start throwing some elements together to start to create some repeats. After really liking my tossed croquis design in my sketchbook i thought it would be nice to create this in a digital format to see if i could make the aliens appear to be floating in space. For this i selected the same aliens i used previously and put them into a repeatable motif using a variety of scale to add depth.

Once happy with the positioning of my aliens i then went about putting them in a half drop repeat. Initially i experimented with both a block and brick repeat; however, found these to be to linear. After creating the repeat i realised that there were far too many aliens densely packed. This is something i did not realise when creating my motif, but only when putting them into a repeat. By the time i had got them into a repeat it was time for my tutorial with Sian so i showed her what i had come up with and she mentioned it was a little boring so i decided to discontinue the process.

Although Sian not liking this outcome i wanted to see how it would look with my liquify background that i had already created so quickly added a background in photoshop. Despite it not receiving good feedback if i worked on this design more i feel it could be a really strong outcome within my collection. I always appreciate the tutors feedback and views; however, i think we have to remember at some point that this is in fact our own project and we need to be happy and proud of the work we are producing.

From here i will start some different designs to gain some additional imagery and then hope to return to this design with some more imagery and ideas which could make this design stronger.