Meet Lauren Broome, a fashion design graduate from the University of East London. Lauren’s collection is inspired by the uniforms worn by whalers that worked on South Georgia in the nineteenth century. Her experimentation with 3D pleating through a selection of garments binds the four outfits together aesthetically, she explains. Read on to learn more about Lauren’s work below!
What is the most valuable thing you have learnt at university?
Overall at university, I learnt who I am as a designer, what my creative personality is and how to make it work best and most effective for me. I really enjoyed the practical side to my course, learning about the skills behind pattern cutting, printing fabrics and sewing. After being pushed to develop my drawing and sketchbook work I came to really enjoy this thoroughly after some practice. I really took to 3D draping and pattern cutting in my first year and used it in almost all of my projects since. In my final year I mixed all the skills I learnt over my time at university and from when I was on placement, my placement was a massive step forward in feeling confident with my pattern cutting. I worked on my final project patterns by integrating draping and flat patterns; I was able to find a process that worked for me after years of trying different ways.
Over the 4 years of university, I developed both in work and as a person, and I still continue to. When I look back, first year me wasn’t confident in her work and struggled to understand the process and was very overwhelmed by the fabric shops. I learnt and found my own style and processes in making my final major project and grew a lot in confidence in my own work. Learning to listen to your own head sometimes is the hardest lesson to learn at university when everyone is telling you different things, but teaching yourself to listen to bits that you want to here and taking them forward is crucial to find out your design style. This development was influenced by my tutors but it was self-driven and took me years to figure it out, and I am still doing so.
What was the starting point of inspiration for your final project?
My collection originated from family photographs that I found in the loft of Grytviken, one of the old whaling stations on South Georgia. The photographs were captivating. The old ruins of the whaling town were interesting as they show that one day no one came back, with bottles still on shelves and all the machinery in place from the day before as it would have been when the station was active. My stepdad took these photographs in 2002. After watching documentaries it was interesting to see how the stations have changed in a small time frame of 5 years.
The photographs led to me start researching heavily into the whaling practises and what the lives of the sailors would have involved. I took inspiration from the blazers they wore as the starting point for my collection silhouette and became one of the core pieces throughout my collection. I took a male blazer, similar to what they would have worn so it created a relaxed tailored fit on the female body. I blended this silhouette with my knowledge and love of 3D pleating. I first came across 3D pleating on an internship.
I developed the pleating so I could do it all by hand for my collection in the studio, and I made my own pleat patterns and steamer to make it specific to my collection and needs. Merging the tailored aspect of the blazer with pleating gave my collection its personality and ornate details. To merge the two skills together took some development and I had to practise and change my techniques many times to get a finalised high standard result. My pleating was done methodically, each garment had to be planned out and sewn in parts before pleating and some parts after to make it all work and fit together as designed.
What form will your final collection take?
My final collection is formed of 4 outfits. I have a silhouette based on the blazers worn by whalers that worked on South Georgia in the nineteenth century. Each outfit has a variation of 3D pleat size within it; from 4cm to 10cm pleat sizes. I also incorporated colour blocking into my design to be able to portray colour more boldly with the pleating as lighting reflected differently off each fabric and pleat size. My first outfit is a trouser suit. The blazer was central to my development of silhouette and colour blocking. Whereas the trousers became a starting point of mixing pleat sizes for my collection.
This outfit was almost a breakthrough in finding an identity for my collection. My other outfits followed on from this point with further development into colour blocking and pleat size. I was bolder with colour choice using a beautiful metallic satin for a pair of wide-leg trousers and mixed I with the other blazers in the collection. To expand my silhouette I experimented with slip dresses and pleat directions within the same pleat pattern.
I developed this technique on the slip dress to create a new texture within the collection and to see if I could create a slip dress which could give some shape to the waist whilst keeping the 3D pleating at the hem. After I was successful with my slip dress design, I developed a long dress for my final outfit adapting the pattern I created, mixing in knife pleats underneath to bring a new pleat element and colour to the dress. This dress has a complex construction, as I have to part construct the lining and outer fabrics before I pleat them to create a 3D effect the whole way down the dress while keeping a clean finish.
What materials have you used and how did you source them?
My final collection bound together through 3D pleating. I first learned to 3D pleat when on an internship. Before and during my final year I developed and made my own pleat pattern blocks, this has allowed me to pleat from my studio, meaning I could tailor my collection’s needs to the process and materials I had made. I focused on the Chevron or Pineapple pleat pattern for my collection. I developed sizes ranging from 4cm to 10cm in a variety of block sizes depending on the pattern pieces of the garment so some of my blocks are meters long and some enough for a sleeve. Alongside developing pleat pattern blocks I created my own steamer to set the fabric in the steam blocks which creates the 3D effect on the fabric which lasts through washing. By adapting the pleating process I was able to change little details and sizes which benefitted the collection.
To work efficiently with my 3D pleating technique I prefer to use man-made fibres. These are able to bend under the heat from the steam and solidify into a new shape that the pleat block creates. I was drawn to Satin fabrics as they gave a glorious sheen under light when mixed with the pleating it gave a lustrous texture and played with the colour tones of the fabric when under certain lighting. I sampled fabric from a variety of sources from fabric shops and the Rag Market in Birmingham to Berwick Street, Shepherds Bush and Shoreditch. I had to test my favourite fabrics in the pleater to see how they looked, as some of the textures would look and behave differently once pleated. After a vast sampling process, I narrowed down my final fabrics, 2 of them came from a shop in Birmingham and the other 4 came from 2 shops in Shepherds Bush.
How has it evolved from your initial ideas and what have you learnt along the way?
Originating from the blazer, my collection developed through its silhouette, fabrications and variations of pleat sizes, whilst also experimenting with scale and colour. Initially, I was working with a man’s blazer similar to what the sailors would have worn on South Georgia. I worked on this silhouette and also researched into smaller design features from the Jacket like pockets. By using a male blazer it gave a relaxed tailored fit on a woman’s body which became my silhouette and it can be seen throughout my collection. After reaching this first crucial point of silhouette, I pleated my first blazer which gave me a starting ground for expanding on my initial ideas. I then experimented with different pleat sizes on the blazer and the trousers.
While pleating blazers I was also experimenting with different types of fusing, discovering which gave enough support to the fabric without being too heavy or thick that they did not disrupt the pleating shapes. I also was trying to find the right fusing and interlinings for lapels and other parts for the blazer as some of the typical tailoring interlinings were not working well with the pleating. To incorporate more of my colour palette within each garment I introduced and experimented with colour blocking.
By experimenting with the scale of both the colour panels and the size of the pleats I was able to get the maximum impact of the pleat shape and light reflection from the garments. Each colour behaved differently under the light when pleated. Throughout my toile and development stages of the garments, I learnt new and better ways to finish my garments, from pin hemming before pleating which allowed the hem to be 3D and not flat to self-lining my dress and sewing it half together to then pleat it and construct the other half.
What are the messages and themes behind your project that you want people to take away? Do explore any topics like diversity, sustainability or politics in your work?
There is no specific topic to be taken away from my collection in the sense of politics, diversity or sustainability. I want my work to convey a sense of freedom to those who wear it, to be bold with colour and their silhouette choice. I wanted people to style up or down garments to make it their own style and personality. In the topic of diversity, I don’t want any limitations, those who want to enjoy my collection can. There are underlining sustainability themes within my collection through my research into the whaling stations on South Georgia. I explored a lot into the lives of the whalers and the practices of whaling. The practices were not sustainable and the deaths of over 1 million whales in Antarctica’s waters was driven by economic greed.
I spoke and made opinions on the sustainability aspect of my research in my dissertation which was written in correlation with my final major project. I wanted to separate this important issue of whaling from my clothing as I wanted the pleating to be the focal point of my collection, not the sustainable and political aspects as they are too important to be sidelined. I feel my dissertation does my research more justice and expands on the reasoning and practices behind whaling and how it developed to be a such prevalent industry for the United Kingdom.
I discuss the link from whaling to fashion through the baleen and how whaling was impacted by fashion as trends changed through the decades of the twentieth century. These changes together with the severe decline in numbers and the growing pressure to protect whales paused the international whaling industry through the International Whaling Convention. As this is such a prevalent issue I will come back to these issues and highlight them through future collections.
What’s an aspect of the fashion industry that you’re passionate about fixing or having a positive impact on?
I have always wanted to be a part of the fashion industry and I have wanted to bring a positive impact when I do become part of it. I want to bring more honesty and open to the industry. I would like to be transparent with my brand, especially with how garments are manufactured; who by and where, where the fabrics are sourced from and are there any inspection reports? I wish to say any changes that I am trying to implement to better myself and my brand to show to my consumer that I am aware that not everything is perfect but I am trying to change these processes within my brand. This honesty about improvements allows the consumers to understand the brand in more depth and understand what they are buying into. To be a part and support the changes that I want to see become widespread throughout the fashion industry means I am helping to set the standard of what to expect from brands when you shop with them. I would like every brand to start to expose their customers to the reality of what they are buying, and start the larger shift to stop fast fashion being so impactful.
As a consumer, I admire when a brand is honest about its supply chain. I appreciate it is hard to be sustainable with every aspect of a brand but to see they are trying and making improvements makes me want to be a part of their brand and buy into the change. To step away from unnecessary multiple collections a season and help consumers realise that they need to stop buying for now but for the long term, make fashion become about long term investments and supporting smaller businesses. I have changed my shopping habits, to try and be more sustainable and support smaller businesses. I still buy from the high street but I have cut down the amount. It is about smaller changes like this which will help the industry to adapt to new consumer climates.
What is your plan once you finish your BA?
I would love to work within the industry gaining more knowledge and experience. I have always aimed to be developing my label, working on my designs and processes to elevate the garments and my business. I want to evolve my label and build relationships within the industry so over the years so I can expand my brand.