Once the decision to study my BA Hons in Design was made, I had to investigate which areas in jewellery were not well informed or those topics that required attention in the designing of jewellery. I was looking to a technique that was not used often in jewellery but was still seen as a reference of beauty.
In the year 2012, I focused my BTech on 'Haute' Jewellery and the design process that constituted it in comparison with 'Haute Couture'. I had thought of researching this topic further in order to distinguish the lack of progress and standard to Ramp jewellery when compared to Haute Couture by dissecting the process of ramp fashion to ready to wear fashion and transforming the process to a jewellery context. The basis to proceed in this study was to look at the trends for 2016 in order to design my jewellery with similar motifs and visual representations of the trends forecasted.
What I found is the increased use of laser prints which I immediately wanted to incorporate in my jewellery. The more I thought of the idea of lace jewellery the more I wanted to know more. The history, the progress, the links in critical theories etc. I also wondered why was lace so intriguing and it has the idea of a sexual connotation behind it and how the binary opposites of concealing yet revealing is linked to it. The idea of covering oneself while allowing certain areas to be visible allows for interest and the curiosity to wanting to see more and know more. I then decided that I would focus on Gender – Feminism and sexuality playing on the ideas of lace jewellery. How it has the ability to be a symbol of purity and at the same time falls under temptation and seduction.
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| Mariambibi Khan, 2014. Bobbin Lace Sample 1 & 2. Crochet Cotton. |
I concentrated on how I could incorporate lace as a jewellery technique. I attempted investigating whether there has been attempts on jewellery made with a lace technique. I had found one book on bobbin lace jewellery, however did not have access to it. This is where I searched for bobbin lace and learned the basic stitch, which I then made a lace strip with crochet cotton (image above). One can see that the lace made with cotton is soft and flimsy however after learning the basic technique of bobbin lace I started visualizing pieces of jewellery with a lace motif. The delicateness of the piece as well as discovering whether it could be done with metal. There has been forms of fine metal wire work such as weaving, chain mail and filigree however none that represented the technique of lace to its core.
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| Mariambibi Khan, 2015. Bobbin Lace Sample 3. Fine Silver |
Above is the sample made in metal. There were some problems I experienced with using metal such as keeping the tension the same as well as breakage of the wire. Annealing the metal while working on the lace is not possible which does create more of a problem. The lace in metal provides a delicate workable presence which can allow for manipulation during the design process. Once I knew that metal lace can be produced, with a few kinks to smooth out, I began my design process.
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| Mariambibi Khan, 2015. Bobbin Lace Sample 4. Fine Silver |
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