In order to get ideas flowing about starting points for my print, I began to consider, what is quintessentially British?
… and based on our…
- British sense of humour and cheekiness
- English heritage (Taken from brief)
Below I brainstormed a number of possibilities:
- Tea, cake, buns, teapots.
(In the brief it is not only described how the brand plays upon british heritage, but how the demographic audience of Cath Kidston likes 'Making stuff… be it food for friends or cushions for her new sofa' see brief.
- Red telephone box.
- Red postbox and stamps.
- Polo (sport).
- Yorkshire terrier.
- Mini cooper.
- Red bus.
- Sticks of rock, Deck chair, Windmills. (British seaside), Ice cream.
- Beefeater.
- Picnics.
- Sailing (seafaring nation).
- Hare.
- British shorthair cats.
- Penny farthing.
Before I get down to any type of sketching/ idea generation I want to look at how the prints are already presented and if they have a certain style.
'We are looking for an original theme and a fresh new take on our unique visual style. Your print can take any visual direction you wish, as long as you believe it to be in tune with our brand.' (Taken from brief)
The prints which we design will be used across 3 areas of products:
- Women's fashion.
- Women's accessories.
- Home.
I found that when looking at this collection of prints, there was a distinct style that was existent throughout each. The prints have most definitely been handrawn before moving onto digital work, Therefore I will endeavor to work solely by hand when drawing up the design.
I also found that the prints follow a very painterly theme that is often accompanied by some pencil sketching.
For example in the horse print:
The painterly effect is particularly reminiscent of oil paintings, Although trying to design using acrylics may prove inappropriate on a timescale, as they take so long to try, I could design in a quicker alternative such as acrylics. Which I would then import into a program such as illustrator. It is important to realise the aesthetic which the Cath Kidston brand has already created as this is particularly stated on the brief.
Cath Kidston's floral prints .vs. oil paintings.
An important detail I have also seen within the prints is there is no evidence of blending colours together to create a collection of tones, shadows, highlights etc. Instead Cath Kidston uses block colours in a variety of shades, placed next to each other in order to create extra dimension, this style is reflective of the arts and crafts movement. The floral pattern seen above, looks particularly like some wallpaper I found from the arts and crafts movement.
I compared my list of initial ideas to current prints, to see if any of them were of similar concept. The brief states that they are looking for a fresh design, 'Our prints are... reinventing our favourites but not copying our past.' (taken from brief) Therefore, I wanted to avoid anything that would lean upon my design being similar to previous ones.
Below is the list of initial starting points I came up with, I have marked the ones with an x that are similar to the prints that Cath Kidston has already had:
- Red telephone box.
- Red postbox and stamps.
- Polo (sport) - X
- Yorkshire terrier.
- Mini cooper.
- Red bus - X
- Sticks of rock, Deck chair, Windmills. (British seaside), Ice cream.
- Beefeater - X
- Picnics.
- Sailing (seafaring nation) - X
- British shorthair cats.
- Penny farthing.
I have seen that previously in many of the Cath Kidston prints that horses have been quite a frequent icon, and so to avoid any sort of repetition I have decided to stray away from any pattern that would include this symbol, thus ruling out polo. I have also seen a red bus within Cath Kidston's iconic London themed print, a print with repetitive use of the london guards, and a print already influenced by sailing. Therefore I will not be persuing any of these 4 ideas.
Below are the 4 prints that have already been influenced by these themes.
The two themes that I would like to work with, which I have seen no influence of in previous Cath Kidston prints are:
- Red postboxes and stamps.
- The british seaside.
As Cath Kidston has its roots firmly set within the british landscape I want to create a print that really celebrates the British Heritage. The red postbox is a hugely iconic british symbol, as is the stamp which houses the portrait of our queen. However I also wanted to try and work on an idea that was quite contrasting to many that Cath Kidston had already produced. In many of the previous prints the place in England that is most celebrated is the capital - London. However I found there wasn't much within the previous range that celebrated other areas of Britain, for this reason I wan't to celebrate a part of the nation that is often cast aside and understated - The British seaside.
I Then began to brainstorm symbols or things associated with the British seaside, I went on to ask my class mates what first came into their minds when they pictured the british seaside. I recorded all these results in a spider diagram.
(Insert picture)
I managed to find a list of 28 things that I and other people associate with the phrase 'British seaside'. From these 28 I began to think about which words would be most relative for the target audience of Cath Kidston. For example, I didn't want to include things within my print that would be more appropriate for a younger audience, and so this made me rule out ideas such as, rock, ice cream, seagulls, rides, donkey's and mini golf etc.
I also had to consider the dynamic of the print, how would each of the symbols relate and harmonize? How would an object such as a stick of candy floss fit cohesively with a lighthouse without them looking like they had just been thrown together like miscellaneous objects into a pattern? For this reason I decided to only pick out subjects from the brainstorm which were landscape/setting based.
There were 9 things within the brainstorm which I thought were most appropriate. These are underlined. These 9 things were:
- Beach huts.
- Deck chairs.
- Carousel.
- Parasol.
-Pier.
- Sand castle.
- Lighthouse.
- Shells.
- Sunshine.
However 9 subjects would prove to be too much for a Cath Kidston print as the aim is for the pattern to not be too fussy and cluttered, for this reason I have decided to narrow down my subjects to the following 5:
- Beach huts.
- Deckchairs.
- Pier.
-Sancastle.
- Shells.
