BROKEN FORM
A STORY ABOUT PORCELAIN CUP & SAUCER
This project investigates the state of two complementary objects following fragmentation and reconstruction. Two objects are created to work together as one, but each can also be utilized independently. The complementary objects chosen in this collection were traditional British cups and saucers.
The analysis of broken porcelain established a pattern cutting methodology that creates three-dimensional structural form from circles in 12 colours of patent leather mixing a multifaceted colour palate where anything works to highlight the tension of the structure. Brass staples and hand stitching emulate methods of repair in a sustainable world, whilst experimental in its approach to menswear, the collection is grounded by ‘Kintsugi’ intarsia knitwear in white and gold.
I broke the cup and saucer with a hammer and then selected some of the fragments to reconstruct them into the shape of the cup and saucer (threedimensional and flat) , which means that some of the fragments in the new cup come from the original saucer. This is the initial experimentation with the deliberate breaking of my porcelain complementary object to ascertain how broken sections can re-positioned to form alternative shapes that can be utilized in the pattern cutting process.
After I got this structure I want to simplify this structure with simple geometric shapes, which means the saucer can be abstractly seen as a circle, and the crack in the middle can be seen as a triangle. In this way, I get a threedimensional structure that is folded from a circle.
The transformation from the cup and saucer breaking experiment to the pattern experiment is visually direct and effective. Even if I don’t add any explanation, you can see the connection between the two from the picture. After got this three-dimensional structure from the folded circle, it could be natural to develop the logical pattern from it.
The cracks resulting from each breakage of the cup and saucer are often random and varied in shape. For instance, at the first time the break might form a triangular crack, while another could produce a circular or parallelogram-shaped pattern. Inspired by this randomness, I incorporated common garment pattern shapes into a circle, replacing the basic geometric shapes.
By folding these circles, I explored different garments structures. At first I simply folded some structures with paper, which can become part of the garment, but the specific wearable pattern structure on the human body must be very different from the folded paper. After these initial attempts confirmed the feasibility of the method, I began experimenting with various patterns to refine and adjust the designs for practical application.
MAKING PROCESS
