My Final Major Project

The project is to design and create one or two costumes for characters from the Roald Dahl books, as though they are appearing in a stage production. Through this, I will be extending previous knowledge using character analysis and costume making. The aim of the project to extend my knowledge of costume design. I would like to use the stages that professional costumes designer use to reach an outcome. I will therefore have a better understanding of how professional costumes designers work.

The Roald Dahl characters are well known from the Quentin Blake illustrations. My challenge will be to explore the books and find new ways of creating them. To start with I will read a number of Roald Dahl’s books and write notes about them. After this I will choose about eight characters to draw designs and one or two of these characters will be looked at more in depth through research and experimentation then made costumes. A starting point for my research will be Manchester Costume Gallery, the experience I have had volunteering at ‘The Acorn Theatre’ and inspiration from performances I have seen. My other influences will be my favourite director Henry Selick and costume designer Colleen Atwood. I also like circus and pantomime styles and may bring these into my project.

My aim will be to use a wide variety of textile and fabrication techniques. This may include sewing, embellishing, pattern making, surface pattern design and possibly mask-making.  In terms of time-scale, there is a helpful diagram in ‘Phaidon Theatre Manual Costume and Make-up by Michael Holt’ which lays out the process and time-scale of creating costume for the theatre. There are eight weeks to complete the project. Research will be ongoing through the whole process and will be added to an online blog. I want to get the base of my research done in the first week. The second I want to design the objects. The third and fourth week I am going to experiment with my ideas and then in the fifth week draw final designs and start making them in the fifth, sixth and seventh week. The final eighth week will be for any finishing off and planning of exhibition.

I will be writing a detailed reflective diary everyday of the project. Each diary entry will include what I have done that day, if I could have done better with it, what I need to do to improve and what I need to do the next day. I am also going to ask fellow students about my work and constructively criticise it to help me with improving it. Finally I will write a 750 word evaluation at the end of the project.

This is a project I have to complete within 8 weeks and it starts now.