my v.m. visuals...

ok so there's alot of them but i was proud of what i did, take a look at my first solo attempt at V.M...

visual merchandising experience...

So last week i managed to land myself the opportunity to get some work experience as a visual merchandiser. a shop in my hometown of bury had recently got fashion clothes in store and when i visited i could tell straight away that they didn't hire a v.m. to arrange the stands, so i took it upon myself to ask them if they would consider me to go and do some experience for them. i would sort out their stands to increase their sales while at the same time gaining the experience i needed to further my career, post-university as a visual merchandiser.

since there had never been clothes in store before since it was a shoe shop, i had complete creative freedom, which turned out to be the hardest part of the job. unlike when i do merchandising for french connection i had nowhere to start. no wet theme or color ways it was completely upto me and...

i loved every minute!

i only had 2 stand to merchandise but it took me around 5 hours to dress the front facing items out and create and order and place all the items. i even got to dress the window mannequin!! it was a great taster for what is to come in my life and i really felt i'd accomplished something when i had finished. fingers crossed he will ask me back to do more work for him as he gets newer and more stock in store.

sandology...

So today i am spending the day emersing myself in the British summer. I am currently working on a brief for Hamleys toystore, to design a window display for their summer window. After brainstorming i have figured the best theme to base my ideas around is the british summer. everyone as memories of the british seaside, building sandcastles and eating candy floss and rock on the pier. Using this idea will hopefully give my designs a sense of nostalgia as well as a fun and creative aspect to them.

The most interesting piece of research i have found is about sand sculptures and artists who create giant sculptures of objects made from sand. Mark Anderson is one of the artists i have come across who's impressive sculptures has earned him clients such as Orange, Selfridges and even commissions for St Paul's Cathedral. Just looking at his sculptures is really inspiring and makes me want to go out and try and create my own, unfortunately i can barely make a sand castle with a bucket and spade let alone carving sculptures out of sand. Below is some of the sculptures he has made over the years.

His work ranges from commissioned pieces for clients like the above for the national rail museum through to fun pieces like the sculpture copy of shrek.

looking at his work has given me some great ideas for sculptures that could go in the Hamleys window, they would be a tourist point as well as something fun and interesting to look at, the theme could also be carried throughout the store with sand sculptures inside and continuing the idea of the british seaside summer.

Whilst cruising through some random blogs the other day i noticed that alot of people blog about what they have recently bought, and since i definately plan on continuing this blog post university, i think i should share my recent purchase.

My second louis Vuitton bag...

bags are my idea of perfection.

M&S gets trendy...

So it may not be the most graphically pleasing advertisement and it may not be the most technical but i think most people will agree the new Marks & Spencer's advert is one of the best in recent years. When i first saw the ad the first thing i wanted to do was start dancing about, the combination of music and imagery makes you feel good about yourself. It gives off the sense that if you shop at Marks & Spencer's you can look and feel like the women in the ad.

They use celebrities to endorse their products, but the choice of celebrity is impeccable, including Danii Minogue, the mother-to-be, Twiggy, renowned model and previous endorser of Marks & Spencers and also Lisa Snowden, model and strictly come dancing contender. the way they have used wholesome, likable and on-trend celeb's emphasises the wholesome yet trendy persona that marks & Spencer want to give off about their brand.

so have a look and feel free to dance around, i do!

beyond excited...

need i say more...

panic opening...

So the opening of the Panic exhibitions seemed to go well. i attended with my friend Kat and loved looking at everyones work and seeing what they had recently been upto. it is a rare opportunity to see the level of work from the majority of the year group as you normally only see work from the smaller tutor groups we are in, and even then the work is rarely seen completely finished.

I didn't realize how much it would affect me seeing my work up there for anyone to go and see. People were walking past and stopping and looking at what we had done and i began to get extremely paranoid about what people were thinking about my work and i was really curious as to what they were saying among themselves about it. unfortunately i'll never know.

these are just a few photographs of some of the work i liked in the exhibition...

mine & Sarah's joint project.

i'm finally getting round to...

Writing about NEW YORK CITY. ok so i went to NYC last october and i'm only just writing about it now. im trying to get all my thoughts and exhibition reviews down so that i can sort out my journal for my degree. NYC was an experience in my life that i will never forget. i went with uni and was a little worried about going, i was with people i knew but i wasn't especially close to them at the time, however i now consider those i went with as some of my closest friends. it's amazing that such a huge city can bring people so close together.

i took over 1000 photographs and laughed probably over 1000,000 times! i was overwhelmed by the sights i saw. it's strange and probably quite cheesy to say that i had never felt i'd fit in somewhere so much in my life. by the time the five days were over i felt like i knew the city like the back of my hand.

we walked the majority of the way round the city, waking at 7am and often not getting back till gone 11pm trying to see everything the island had to offer. Even on the odd occasion we travelled by subway it was a doddle. although it was tiring we preferred to walk so as to take in everything we possibly could.

I went to NYC with an overweight case, and i came home with a case i could barely even wheel! i spent probably about £800, the most i've ever spent in 5 days! but it was totally worth it. i managed to stick tot he rule of buying only the things i couldn't buy when i was at home, so in other words i bought touristy thing. it was every penny well spent :)

For all i was buying tourist items i didn't look like a tourist on several occasions i was approached by people asking for directions around the city, yep that's right people thought i lived in NEWYORK!

To this day it still depresses me that i am not at this moment sat in magnolia bakery looking out onto the busy streets.

it is the one place i have found where i felt like i truly belonged and the once place where no matter what the weather was like and no matter where i was going i had smile on my face.

I recently attended a portfolio surgery with Ian Anderson. i tried to think of as many possible ways to get out of it, i was to put it nicely (shitting) myself!! even though i had met him before and even done a workshop of his, i knew how honest he could be and was worried that he was going to fully let go when he saw my portfolio. despite enjoying the projects i do and thinking my outcomes were good, i know that my tutors don't think the same and worried that Ian was going to feel the same as them about my work. Thankfully nothing got said about my actual work, it was all about my presentation technique; which i was quite happy with. the only criticism that i was given was to be more confident about my work. i wasn't as fully prepared for the surgery as i would have hoped, i didn't know what was going to be asked of me and thought the questions and criticisms were going to be directed at my work, but they were just directed at my presentation techniques. i'd worried so much about the work in my portfolio that i hadn't rehearsed the presentation as much. maybe if i had i would have come across alot more confident about my work.

reality hits...

It has taken me until now to realise the reality of my situation. there are merely weeks left until the end of my degree and i am starting to worry about my life ahead. although i know what i want to do in life the idea that it might not happen or that it truly is all upto me to get myself to where i want to be is starting to really scare me. but typically i have been finding ways to avoid helping myself and getting the work done by staring into space and faffing around on facebook. clearly it isn't getting me anywhere. but hey im British, avoiding the situation is what we do best... i have avoided it enough, its time to get back on track.