Day Nine

Finally, we had an uneventful (rodent free) night and everyone was well-rested to begin the workshop. We assembled in the pattern making lab and Şölen introduced the brief to the students. They were asked to work in pairs, one Indian student and one Turkish student. Several pairs had already formed before today’s workshop, and the remaining students decided to select their partners by chance from a draw. They are as follows:

Başak Cankeş – Aditi Sharma
Begüm Kapan – Abhilasha Choudhary
Yasemin Biricik – Shaivya Ruchi
Burcu Yıldız –Ruchika Gupta
Müge Elmacılar – Mayur Bhansali
Olgay Ergin – Rohan Sabharwal
Merve Sepetoğlu – Manas Ranjan
Ayşegül Göçen – Sartaj Saifi
Derya Gürbüz – Shwetank Kumar

Turkey and India are developing countries in terms of creating and communicating their global fashion brands. In both countries, contemporary designers seek international exposure through the modern exploitation of their cultural heritage, and rich traditions found in their historical textiles and costumes. Turkey is in a transitional period of developing cultural material into an international design language. In India, with the help of international fashion weeks and efficient institutions, designers are conserving the crafts related to the creation of Indian textiles, in tune with the industrial systems of production and marketing. Essentially, the integration of cultural research into design education in a pedagogical manner provides the backbone for developing a cultural identity in the contemporary fashion arena. This can be achieved by crossing the bridge between generations, recognizing the importance of cultural and historical design sources and re-interpreting their influence on contemporary design practice.
After underlining the importance of the cross-cultural dimension in contemporary design practice for both Turkish and Indian fashion, in pairs students were required to make a brain-storming session. What do they understand from Turkish culture and Indian culture? What are the components for reading a culture visually? How can they translate cultural indicators in to contemporary fashion?
In this cross-cultural workshop students are asked to explore, analyse and interpret key aspects of both cultures. From the assembled research, and with due respect to both cultures, they are asked to design a hybrid range of garments. The design interpretation must be both contemporary and wearable , and in no way related to the traditional clothing style of either culture.

Objectives

To introduce another culture while creating an awareness to their native culture.
To explore ways of understanding cultural material and to translate findings in to a contemporary design element
To create an international design language by translating cultural material in to modern looking international design solutions

Week 1 - Design Concept & Design Development

Monday - Research analysis.
Tuesday - Cultural Mapping
Wednesday - Concept Development Moodboards, Fabric experimentation
Thursday - Design development & Sketches
Friday - Final Design Illustration & Sketchbooks Presentations

Week 2 - Product Realization & Presentations

Monday - Technical Drawing & Pattern development
Tuesday - Pattern cutting & sewing
Wednesday - Finishing the garment
Thursday - Styling and photography
Friday - Final presentation and Fashion show

For the first day, the students are asked to create an A3 “Cultural Mapping” Board which explain various key aspects of both Indian and Turkish culture.

After an initial brain-storming session, each group decided to focus on specific aspects of their individual cultures and began to compare and contrast with their counterparts.

Begum and Abhilasha focused on a combination of Indian and Islamic calligraphy, including the Turkish art of calligraphy, Hat, which added a more spiritual approach to the mapping. They also contrasted the god of dance, Natraj with the Mevlana dancers from Turkey.

In their visually striking board, Yasemin and Shaivya researched the Islamic connection between Turkey and India but focused primarily on the motifs and architecture. By abstracting the imagery they were able to create a clean, graphic cultural map.

Başak and Adidi managed to collage a vibrant mapping, bursting with well-chosen imagery reflecting the colours, motifs and traditions of both cultures. One interesting reference point was differences and similarities between the facial expressions of the traditional women in both cultures which they will develop further into the communicative properties of their designs.

The result of the first days workshop was very encouraging. Each group successfully explored the idea of hybridity through the different aspects of both Turkish and Indian culture which is promising for contemporary design solutions in the following days.