• Skip to main content

HAWTHORNE & HEANEY

Embroidery Specialists

  • ABOUT
  • OUR SERVICES
    • HAND EMBROIDERY
    • DIGITAL EMBROIDERY
    • MONOGRAMS & LOGOS
    • POP-UP EVENTS
    • CLASSES
  • CLASSES
    • LONDON EMBROIDERY SCHOOL
  • BLOG
  • SHOP
    • MASONS MILITARY BADGE & BUTTON SHOP
    • LONDON EMBROIDERY SCHOOL
  • JOBS
  • CONTACT

dressmaking

Hawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion

October 13, 2017 by Natasha Searls-Punter

When a major fashion exhibtion comes to London, we love to go and see what it is all about and the Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion Exhibition currently on at the Victoria and Albert Museum does not disappoint. Based in the fashion and textiles section of the museum, the exhibition goes through from the beginnings of Balenciaga as a brand, through to current designers that Balenciaga has influenced.

Starting downstairs, most of the historical garments and accessories are displayed with accompanying notes and toiles. There are a few pieces which have a video animation next to them of how the pattern goes together to make the garment function which are very informative and really demonstrate the complexity of the designs:

View this post on Instagram

#balenciaga @vamuseum #patterncutting

A post shared by Tasha Searls-Punter (@tashasearlspunter) on Oct 13, 2017 at 1:28am PDT

This accompanies the actual garment which it explains as well as a calico toile of the garment. A few pieces from the collection have been x-rayed as can be seen in the back of the next video which shows the many layers that go into a piece like this and the hidden support within some of the ‘simpler’ looking gowns.

View this post on Instagram

@vamuseum #balenciaga #fashion #london

A post shared by Tasha Searls-Punter (@tashasearlspunter) on Oct 13, 2017 at 1:32am PDT

Hawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion London Hand EmbroideryX-ray photograph of silk taffeta evening dress by Cristóbal Balenciaga, 1955, Paris, France. X-ray by Nick Veasey, 2016. © Nick Veasey

They have a section which is dedicated to the fabric choices and embroideries used in some of the historical Balenciaga pieces. These include a wonderfully rich example of silk shading on a gown with an impossibly tiny waist and a very decadent textured jacket. The base embroidery of the jacket is demonstrated by an embroiderer from Paris based embroiderers Lesage recreating the design. See below for a snippet of the tambour beading over long silk stitching.

Hawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion London Hand EmbroideryHawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion London Hand EmbroideryWild silk evening dress (detail), Cristóbal Balenciaga with embroidery by Lesage, 1960 – 2, Paris, France. Museum no. T.27-1974. © Victoria and Albert Museum, LondonHawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion London Hand Embroidery

View this post on Instagram

A little tambour beading demo from one of the videos at the #balenciaga exhibition on now at @vamuseum #embellishment #handembroidery #london

A post shared by London Embroidery School (@londonembschool) on Oct 13, 2017 at 1:35am PDT

Going through the exhibition, the different approaches to each of the pieces are explained as Cristobal Balenciaga applied both tailoring and dressmaking techniques to his pieces. He was know for his surgical precision, often pictured in a lab coat measuring and remeasuring sections. A selection of traditional tailoring tools are displyed including shears, pressing ham, chalk shaving box and tracing wheel.

Hawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion London Hand EmbroideryCristóbal Balenciaga at work, 1968, Paris, France. Photograph by Henri Cartier-Bresson. © Henri Cartier-Bresson/Magnum PhotosHawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion London Hand EmbroideryMoving upstairs, the exhibition focuses more on Balenciagas lasting legacy and those he has inspired. Against the dombed ceiling, three videos of current designers such as Mollie Goddard and Gareth Pugh who speak about how Balenciaga has influenced them and their design work. A series of parallels are drawn between contemporary designs and historical Balenciaga pieces such as the below by Hussein Chalayan and Oscar De La Renta which are likened to textured coat and silk work dress previous mentioned.

Hawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion London Hand Embroidery Hawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion London Hand Embroidery Hawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion London Hand Embroidery Hawthorne & Heaney Visits Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion London Hand EmbroideryThis exhibition is a well rounded insight into the Balenciaga brand with lots of lovely couture examples and the technical specification to go with them which is interesting for those with and without exisiting fashion knowledge.  Balenciaga: Shaping Fashion will be running at the Victoria and Albert Museum‘s Fashion and Textiles Gallery Space (Room 40) until Sunday 18th February 2018 so if you have the opportunity to see it, it is worth the visit. Tickets cost £12.00 and some concessions are available.

All images and videos courtsey of Natasha Searls-Punter (@tashasearlspunter) unless otherwise stated.

Filed Under: Embroidery, Fashion, London Tagged With: Balenciaga, beading, bespoke, couture, design, dresses, dressmaking, embellishment, embroidery, fashion, gowns, London, pattern, pattern cutting, Shaping Fashion, silk shading, silk work, Tailoring, tambour beading, toiling, tools, V & A Museum, VAM, victoria and albert museum

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project

February 9, 2017 by Natasha Searls-Punter

In the studio we like to continue to challenge ourselves and push to create something new with our skills, so at the end of last year, we set ourselves a bit of a challenge to create a dress to wear to the BTBA Festival Dinner in February.

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand EmbroideryHawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Like with all create processes, it started with some sketching and sampling to decide what style we were going to go for.

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand EmbroideryHawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

We look at both hand embroidery and machine embroidery options, and given the time scale, decided it was best to go for a machine embroidery design which combined a few of our favourite techniques.Using an exisitng pattern, we tweeted the patternt to better fit the design and the body on which it would fit by toiling with the help of our intern Jessica.

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Once we were happy with the pattern, we construced the skirt and began applying the embroidery to the flat skirt and top panels.

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Along side the main production we also produced some technical samples to deal and test some of the more tricky aspect of this piece, for example, doing a test to insert a sip to see how close to the embroidery we could go because of the stifness of the backing supporting the fabric and the height of the padding under the stitches.

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Once all the embroidery was finished, it all went back to Jessica to make it up.

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

 

Hawthorne & Heaney on our Dress Making Project London Hand Embroidery

Design/Embroidery by Natasha Searls-Punter and Pattern Cutting/Toiling by Jessica Eykel at the Hawthorne & Heaney Studio

Filed Under: Embroidery, Fashion, London Tagged With: BTBA, cad, Collaboration, construction, dress, dressmaking, embellishment, embroidery, Hawthorne & Heaney, intern, jessica, machine embroidery, pattern cutting, sampling, stitching, studio project, teamwork, toiling

  • Facebook
  • Twitter
  • Instagram
  • Pinterest
  • Email
  • +44 (0)20 7886 8574

© Copyright 2018