Traces of the everyday embedded in textile
Rietveld graduate (2008 TXT) Marie Ilse Bourlanges visited the Slow Design research class on Thursday 12 February to present about her graduation project, ‘Decay,’ a collection of sweaters exploring complex relationships of time, the body and materiality. By taking the class through her project from concept to final product, Marie Ilse revealed the deep and mindful processes of research, design development, experimentation, and production that enriched her project. She talked about sources of inspiration: the work of writer/biologist Midas Dekkers, the concept of Time in the work of Belgian fashion designer Martin Margiela, the symbiotic relationship of crumbling architectural forms and the natural forces that overtake them, patterns of cellular growth and decay, and the hidden treasures of a threadbare teddy belonging to her niece (among others). She also described the evolution of her pattern, which derived from capturing subtle, everyday body movements and subsequently was subjected to fractal geometry, while also providing instructive detail about her various stages of experimentation with materials and techniques. Marie Ilse’s project is a beautiful example of Slowness as a process of designing, and also Slowness as a more engaged and reflective experience of a designed artifact. Her work on this project demonstrates how Slow Design tools and persepectives were supported and enhanced by the atmosphere of the Rietveld, and it hopefully was reminder to the Basic Year students about both the opportunities and intrinsic responsibilities of creative education.
download this thesis: ‘Decay’ by Marie Ilse Bourlanges was
the Winner, of the GRA Thesis Award 2008
