Mahalia Sobers

Reynaud, C., Cosson, Z. and Sienkiewicz, K., 2019. The Artistic Legacy Of The Black Panther Party In The San Francisco Bay. [online] Switch (on Paper). Available at: <https://www.switchonpaper.com/en/the-artistic-legacy-of-the-black-panther-party-in-the-san-francisco-bay/> [Accessed 22 May 2020].

Todaytix.com. 2017. Todaytix | Theater Tickets To Musicals, Plays, Broadway Shows, More. [online] Available at: <https://www.todaytix.com/x/philadelphia/shows/8495-black-panther-project-a-living-oral-history> [Accessed 29 March 2020].

Arafat, B., n.d. Pin On Comrades In History. [online] Pinterest. Available at: <https://www.pinterest.co.uk/pin/570198002815614257/> [Accessed 29 March 2020].

Overall, I am pleased with the progression, and final results I have created within the Signature Project. I have been able to design contemporary looks for the modern day activist, whilst retaining elements inspired by the Black Panther Party, and wider 70s fashion trend. I believe that this selection can be worn proudly by the modern activist, and that a sense of unity will be felt by anyone who sports these designs.

The first leads which helped me define the outcome of my project, came from researching designers, who would incorporate history, art, and interesting silhouettes, within their garments. I decided to look at Massimo Giorgetti, and Mary Katrantzou. I fell in love with the dynamic shaped used acroos their garments, as well as the broad and varied number of textiles they used to make up a singular garment. For instance, Giorgetti definitely influenced the silhouettes of many of my garments in this collection, as well as the loud pattern clashing used throughout his Fall 2020 collection

Another important moment within this project, was when I re-designed my garments. At first, they lacked direction, appearing to be generic, simple, and uninspired. However, by looking closer at the design details used throughout traditional Panther uniform, and other 70s fashion trends, I was able to advance my designs. I added a wider range in volume or fabric to sleeves or trouser legs, began to use more garment layers, and add more detailed stitching. If I were to develop my designs further, I would add more stitched details, possibly in different shapes or areas of the clothing piece, in order to make the designs more eye-catching.

My favourite designs that I have created within this project, has been the textiles samples. I really like experimenting with different ways to make patterns, both digitally, and physically. These samples became as important as the garment design, as I really aimed for both these elements to have strong connections to the 1970s. Furthermore, the presence of my own patterns, would help me stand out against traditional 70s patterns. This also offered to be a visible indicator of difference between the original Black Panthers, who dressed head to toe in black, with my modern interpretation of the group, who will embrace the vibrancy of colours and patterns. If I had the chance to add more samples to this collection, I would incorporate more graphic prints, perhaps using my own illustrations to add more dimension to the patterns.

Now that my final garments have been designed, I am able to experiment with different textile arrangements for the clothes. The patterns that I have used come from a range of my newer designs, as well as samples that have been shown previously on my blog. The selections of samples featured in these edits can be seen above.

I am very happy with each of the combinations I have tried. In my opinion, the bold colours are very reminiscent of the 1970s decade. The pattern arrangements have largely been influenced by Prada’s SS17, and  Giorgetti’s fall 2020 collection, where they used several patterns, sometimes broken up with a singular block colour, to adorn their designs. Therefore, I have tried to not use the same colour schemes, or pattern styles within one look.

Moreover, I think these designs would be a perfect fit for the modern day Panther. The bold colours can attract a younger demographic, which is ideal, as I am designing for around a 18-24 year old. Moreover, the loud nature of the clothes, and the fact that they will stand out, reflects the person who will be wearing them. As aforementioned, a modern day Panther will be someone who actively takes action, and speaks out against unjust treatment that they see within society, in other words, they break away from the crowd.

When researching 1970s fashion in more depth, I realised that many of the Panthers wore promotional badges as part of their uniform. Different graphics would be featured on these badges, including their Panther logo, a picture of inspirational black people, like athlete Jesse Owens, or slogans. Some of the original badges can be seen below.

Therefore, to pay homage to the original party through my new Panther movement, I decided to make my own badges. My first design features a black rainbow. I thought that this would be effective imagery for the new Panther movement, as it is a symbol of peace, and new horizons. In recent years, the traditional rainbow has been adopted by the LGBTQIA+ community, and similar to race minorities, they are a group who have been persecuted, both socially, and politically throughout history. Thus, meaning that another possible interpretation of the black rainbow, being that it is the union of different marginalised groups; Reiterating the fact that I want anyone who feels strongly against the maltreatment of people in today's society, to feel empowered by my clothes, regardless of a person’s background.

The second badge features a map of the world, reminding us that there are people from every country, who strive for peace and equal treatment within their individual communities. With the last badge being a simple ‘R’. I will add these to my final line up of garments, once I have finished adding the textiles.

After coming to the conclusion that my previous garments were too generic and lacked inspiration, I went on the task to develop my designs further.

The first step was to identify certain design details of 1970s clothes in more depth. The collection of pictures below shows some examples of my research.  From the different shaped collars, silhouettes of the trousers and sleeves, to the buttons used of the Black Panther jackets, I aimed to add these elements into my garments. Although, I still wanted to keep a modern feel to the garments, meaning that I did not intend to copy the style of the clothes completely.

I began to sketch out possible designs that could be used, making sure to incorporate these specific 70s references. When I was happy with designs, I drew them in Illustrator. The vectors below show my refined garments drawn onto models, as well as in the form of technical drawings. I am much happier with these designs, they have clear 70s design features, and the silhouettes used in the designs are much more varied, making for an interesting final selection.

Stella McCartney is a designer who experiments with shape, cuts and volume to create her final designs. In this blog post, I will specifically look at her Winter 2019 collection, which I believe could inspire my final garment designs.

She stated that her aim in this collection was to blur the assigned genders of her clothes, which meant incorporating both masculine, and female elements within the same garment. For instance, in the black leather coat shown above, has a cinched waistline, with broad shoulders, which illustrates this gender juxtaposition McCartney intended for. This garment stands out to me the most from this collection. I love the way all the shapes, and detailing work together, to create this final dramatic piece. The fact that it is made out of black leather, and features a turtleneck, reminds me of the Black Panthers. Although I do not want to create such dramatic silhouettes within my collection, I could use certain design elements displayed in this garment, within my designs. For instance, the ribbing on the neck of the coat, or the leather material used. I think that this would enhance my final designs, as right now, they are very plain, and two dimensional.

Taking the images and designs I favoured most from my pattern collage, I decided to manipulate some, and put them into repeat patterns which will be used on my textiles. I made all of the following designs on Adobe Photoshop and did them each in three different colourways.

The first sample which I put into a repeat pattern, was the swirled line design. I really like how each of these colourways appear, definitely reminding me of the bold patterns of the 70s. They oddly remind me of camouflage prints, which are able to be linked back to the Black Panthers military style. I have colour matched the next row of patterns, which features the word ‘reign’ in repeat, with the swirl samples. I chose to use the same colour scheme, and this will allow me to see how the colours interact with each other, when in different designs.

The third row of patterns are made up of distorted pictures that I have taken of New York, and flowers, both of which I thought would make interesting final outcomes. As previously mentioned within this blog, I chose the pictures taken in America, as this is where the heart of the Civil Rights, and Black Panther Movement was: The flowers can be seen as a juxtaposition to the violence endured by the black communities in the times of the Panthers. Or alternatively, as flowers are widely thought of as symbols of peace and beauty, this could represent the victorious changes that they made of a result of their activism. The process showing how I made these designs is shown in the video below.

Overall, I really like the techniques used, and the final outcomes of these designs. I was mainly inspired by Prada to make an array of different pattern styles which could be interacted with each other, to create clashing compositions. I will experiment with this further, when my final garment designs have been made. The last 3 patterns in particular remind me of Mary Katrantzou, a fashion designer who I have researched previously in this blog. She too, is known for her loud clashing patterns, often pairing realistic, decorative, abstract samples together.

Prada is a fashion house which has always appealed to me, from their ability to combine sculptural silhouettes, with contemporary garments, and how they use interesting patterns and colours to accentuate outfits. In particular, the Prada spring, summer collection of 2017 is a selection that I believe will positively impact my garment development. This collection has been inspired by many of the fashion trends popular in the 1970s. With the floral and geometric clashing patterns, mock necks and dramatic collars, accentuated by the use of wild bold colours. Prada was able to encapsulate the decade’s fashion trends. When comparing my garment designs with Prada’s, it is easy to see how much my designs are lacking in inspiration.

Prada has used a range of simple, yet effective methods to pay ode to the 70s. For instance, layered garments on top of each other, a popular practice at the time, including putting crop tops over formal shirts, and dresses over turtlenecks. This allows the viewer to easily identify the era the fashion house is emulating, whereas if the same person were to look at my designs, I think they would have trouble linking them to the 1970s. By simply adding more layers to my outfits, this will definitely add more character to my designs.

This layering techniques also allows us to see all of the different silhouettes, and shapes Prada has used on their garments. Some are clean cut, with straight lines and angles, some cropped, displaying the model’s skin or the clothes underneath, as well as some being loose and free flowing. I love how they have paired these different silhouettes together, creating different and unique final looks, that are uncommonly seen in today's fashion trends. I will be aiming to add more distinctive shapes within my own designs, by perhaps changing the shapes of sleeves and trouser legs or altering necklines.

In regard to the bold patterns Prada uses, I will definitely be able to draw inspiration from them, when it comes to selecting and designing my final samples. Firstly, they have used a wide range of different artistic styles including plaid, geometric, floral, and traditional 70s patterns. I believe that when I put some of the samples I have made, shown in the ‘Pattern Collage’ blog post, into a repeat, they will have the same effect as Prada’s patterns. However, I will still continue to design more samples, so I have a strong final collection to choose from, towards the end of this project.  The pieces I select will depend on how they are able to interact with different patterns and colours as well as how they appear on the garment. For instance, many of the patterns in this SS17 collection, clash with one another. Creating bold final looks, reminiscent of the loud 70s style. This pattern clashing method will also be used in my final looks.

Overall researching into this particular collection has been very informative and will certainly influence my final results.

With my first draft of garment designs finished. I felt more comfortable in making the new patterns for the garments. The collage displayed above shows a variety of the patterns I have made, and pictures I have taken put together in a collage. The purpose of this exercise was to see how different imagery could interact with each other, in terms of colours, style, and size. This also being a useful way for me to come up with new pattern layout ideas.

Within this collage, I have included both overt and subtle imagery relating to the Black Panthers. For instance, there are pictures taken in the USA, which was the heart of the black civil rights movement in the 20th century: There is also the collection of 1960s and 70s activists, that I previously used in my Emory Douglas artist copy. I have used text to also reference the Panthers: ‘reign’ has been derived from my project name being ‘Panther Reign’, and the word ‘liberation’ was inspired by the original Panthers’ aims, being to free black people from a racist system.

One of the ways in how I experimented with the photographs in particular, was by adding after effect, which included blurring and warping them. I think that they would make good graphics that could be used on top of the textiles I design. This could give my final garments more of an interesting final look, more interesting than just using a single type of print to decorate the materials.

You will also be able to see my own designs in this collage, that I made using both Illustrator and Photoshop. I have inserted these designs below. I particularly like the continuous line face drawings that I made, which could represent the unity, and sense of belonging between the modern day, and past activists. Moreover, these designs could easily be an overlay pattern, accentuating different parts of the garment, or different patterns. I have begun to experiment with this in the collage, laying them over various photographs and samples.

I thought that an important part of textile design was making sure to explore with different creative techniques. The images below show various ways in how I started to use both physical, and digital methods to make possible textiles.

The first collection of images above, shows my first attempt at creating patterns and shapes, using only coloured pencils and scissors. I was not a fan of any of the overall looks, mainly because the silhouettes looked very generic. However, I did like elements, such as the one-line design shown in the top right corner, as well as some of the more vibrant colours I have used. I will definitely be able to incorporate these into my textiles. My intention is to put some of these pencil drawings into digital form, meaning that I can easily edit them onto the garments when ready.

I have created these colour wheels, to identify the trends of colours used in the various patterns, and themes that relate to my project.

The first wheel that I made was of the pastel colours, inspired by the patterns I had made previously in response to my 1970s collage, which can be seen in a previous post. These shades bring a sense of calm and subtlety, compared to the bold colours of the original wheel. I had used this shade range for my first patterns, as I believe they are associated with more modern palettes. For instance, if you were to convert the colours found in traditional 1970s patterns, with pastel colours, the final result would look cleaner cut, and up to date. However, I do not think that I will be using this shade range in my final selection, as these colours do not stand out to me enough.

The centre wheel shows the traditional black uniform of Panthers. Black is a bold colour, signifying power and dignity, which certainly helped them stand out from the crowd. However, within my project, I would like to use more colour and patterns on my garments. This will show people that I do not wish to replicate the imagery of Panthers completely. Instead, I wish to represent my interpretation of how a modern day, young activist would present themselves. In my opinion, they would wear bold, bright colours, similar to the tones found in the original, and 70s colour wheels.

The images above show my new fashion illustrations which will be used to display my final garment designs.

I began by drawing rough sketches using a pen and paper, to decide on the overall aesthetic I would be happy with as my final results. This included the development of facial features, drawing style, and body shapes. I decided to go with these simpler designs, and I think if I were to draw the models more realistically, it would take away attention from the clothes. My preliminary sketches can be seen below. I constructed these final vectors on Adobe Illustrator, as I can alter them if needed, and I will be able to insert my textile designs easily onto the clothing.

The clothes the models are wearing have been taken from my garment designs, which can be viewed on previous posts. Seeing them for the first time on a body, I think that I need to make my designs less generic, especially to the menswear outfits. I want people to be able to quickly relate my designs to 1970s fashion trends, however, with the lack of clear inspired design, the garments look very common.

Ideally within my final section, I want to design 8-10 strong looks. Each look needs to show all elements of the Black Panthers, whether it be through a 70s inspired design feature, the shape of the garment, or the textiles I use to make it.

The image above shows my initial set of designs that I drew on Illustrator. This being my first attempt, I decided to make the designs more paired back and simple, in order to get an idea as to how my final selection could look. Thus, drawing basic loungewear clothing, void of 70s style or Panther features, excluding the two last garments: the jacket and military beret. Although I do want there to be an element of comfortability within some of my designs, I felt that it was important to create more dynamic, and interesting designs to begin this journey.

The improved selection can be seen below. I began this process by analysing the shapes of the garments from the fashion brand, MSGM, as I really like the overall look of their collection. They were able to create a vast amount of styles, through altering or manipulating certain design elements. For instance, the volume of the sleeves, or neckline of a top.

Massimo Giorgetti, and his fashion brand, MSGM, creates garments that use both textiles, and shape, to create a dramatic, clean final effect. I have chosen this brand to research, because I also would like to use these methods, in order to make interesting final looks.

The images above show looks from Giorgetti’s Fall 2020 collection, where he has collaborated with the Italian horror film director, Dario Argento. The two creatives’ most stand out looks from this collection includes their Dracula styled models, shown below, and their blood red motifs, which adorned many garments in the collection.

The first thing that stood out to me about these garments, were the interesting, yet simple silhouettes, for they could be worn as an everyday clothing item, yet they appear to be more unique than what a customer could find on the high street. He has created these interesting shapes by altering the amount, or movement of the material. For instance, in the images above, you will be able to see how Giorgetti has used various sleeve designs to change the shape of the garment. Some are very ruffled and voluminous, which reminds me of early 20th century feminine power; As well as some garments having straight, and overly long arms, covering their hands. In my opinion, this collection could easily be utilised in a thriller film, as the garments are very costume-like, without being overbearing or theatrical.

The sketchbook page above, shows my first physical collage inspired by 70s culture and design.

Some of the images include blaxploitation posters, pictures of the Black Panthers, and Soul Train dancers the purpose of this collage was for me to visually identify how each of these elements could cohesively fit together, through imagery, colour schemes, and garment designs.

I also wanted to explore the different sides of black culture in America during the decade.

On the one hand, popular perception leads people to believe that the Panthers were a stoic, and strict group of people, who lacked a joyful existence. Other people who may be perceived in this way also include activists such as Malcom X, and Stokely Carmichael. This is understandable, as the stakes they were fighting against were extremely high, their lives and freedom were at risk; Clearly evidenced by the amount of black political voices who were targeted by the authorities, and or assassinated after standing up for their rights. They undoubtedly had heavy social responsibilities.

However, in actual fact, these are the people who supported every form of black empowerment, whether it be in sports, music, or productions. Therefore, within this collage, I have also included pictures of Soul Train, and blaxploitation movie posters. These two expressions of black culture were ground-breaking, it was unheard of at the time, for there to be successful black lead productions, with so many black people on the television screen at once.  This for me, is when the line between the political activists, and entertainers becomes blurred; both having the soul aim to break barriers. They were unapologetically celebrating their culture and breaking down barriers.

When thinking about 70s fashion, the bold prints are one of the first things to come to my mind. As you can see on the collage, they are often made up of broad swirls and interesting designs. These patterns can stand out from the crowd, something which I also want to accomplish within my designs, therefore I think it will be important to incorporate these within my garments. I have made four samples in response, trying to reinterpret the strong shapes the traditional patterns use, shown below.