Noir et Blanc

This painting, for me, was the clear definition in my head of what the transition between perfection and instability is or even stability and instability. The lines are all over the place connecting and stopping, flowing and curving to be stopped by masses of bright white that come together in a similar fashion. 

Books, Bits, Transitions, and Bicycles

I designed a book cover having to do with my event. The book is called What's That Word for The Transition from Perfection to Instability?. It's about my move and transition from my content life in Greece to a bustling, hectic new city that I don't know very well at all. The book goes into detail about the various hardships and dynamic events I had to endure and experience upon arriving back in 

New York.

Inspiration for the book cover was derived from this photo I took of a bicycle in the West Village. I feel that my transition from Greece to New York was quite similar to when one learns to ride a bicycle. When you start out, you fall a bunch of times and make lots of mistakes, but progressively you learn how to ride the bike and handle yourself well. A bicycle is a symbol of travel and change, and I believe it really sums up the message I wanted to convey through transition and this idea of an in between perfection and instability. 

Exploring Paper

Before even thinking about the actual design for my garment I toyed with different techniques of folding, weaving, and cutting paper in order to get an idea of how to construct my garment.
I used colors from my event painting palette that I felt really conveyed a specific mood.

Gestures, Poses, Figures and Things

I worked with two nude models, utilizing Sumi Ink. This was my personal exploration and interpretation of the human body through various dramatic poses and gestures.

An Armored Garment: The Design Process

Once again, it all started with our Event! My event was me moving back to New York from Greece and having to endure all these changes and make the transition from perfection to instability.

The idea was to construct a garment out of manipulated paper that would shield or protect the person wearing it from his or her event. This particular concept didn't really pertain to my event because it's more of a transition  than an actual event that happened in the moment. I chose to find inspiration elsewhere. 

I visited the Prada; Schiaparelli, Impossible conversations exhibit at the MET along with the medieval times: Armor exhibit, and the Arts of Africa, Oceania, Asia, and the Americas exhibit.  

The garment that I constructed was a compilation of different concepts, pieces, techniques of construction, shapes, and textures that I found interesting and inspiring from the various exhibits I visited. I made sure to sketch what ever I found interesting and potentially inspiring. Below are various sketches I did from the exhibits.

After figuring out all these sketches and looking at the various photos I took from the Met, I started to draw some rough sketches of what I'd like my garment to look like.  

Once the sketching was sorted, I decided to review my Ideas and pick the design that would be most challenging and most practical under time constraints and limited supplies.

I chose to keep the palette of the garment consistent with the painting that I made earlier so I looked back at my sketchbook at the palette that I recorded and decided on an appropriate color-way for my garment.

My Garment features a Quinacridone Magenta, Kimono styled vest  with a combination of Querky-Yellow and Afrikaans-Violet petals that run delicately down the sides. The torso of my garment is hand stitched together with bright, white thread, and the fringe is affixed to the hem of the vest with rubber cement. The black hem of the garment is attached to the vest with rubber cement as well. All of the paper utilized to construct this garment is painted on using acrylic paints; some having more layers than others.  The actual stitching of the garment was quite tedious, and I had to treat the paper really delicately when making each individual stitch in fear of the paper ripping.
My Garment's purpose is to make the wearer feel protected and noticed; to not conform to society, yet feel secure enough to wear the garment. The torso of the vest is pieced together in an armor-like manner so that wearer feels secure and confident in what they are doing.
Specifically pertaining to my event of transitioning into a new city, the garment provides security, stature, and edge which is what I believe are the necessities in transitioning into something new.

               

Product Design: Marisa Chentakul X Alexander Menjivar // MOOD BAND

Marisa and I collaborated on designing a headband, called the Mood Band, that hides and expresses one's emotions in order for them to project a certain demeanor or maintain privacy within his or her life.
The Mood Band has a wide range of uses. For example, if a mother is having difficulty with what her baby needs when he or she is acting up or hysterical crying, the mother could most definitely make use of our product in that she could place the Mood Band on her baby's head and press the 'Express button', and find out what her baby needs in that moment. Another example would be when one is having a particularly horrible day, whether it be work related, relationship related, etc. and then have to retain his or her composure in a specific situation; the Mood Band would help the consumer accomplish their retainment of emotions.
The Mood Band can Express just as well as Hide one's emotions from the outer, judgmental world we all know too well. It is capable of expressing your emotions by displaying what you're feeling or your current state of mind on a 1 inch LED screen that runs across the front of the headband. The band comes in two different styles and sizes. One being 24x2 inches, and the other being 1/2x24 inches. The Headbands come in different color-ways, one geared towards men and one geared towards women; however, marisa and I believe it is a unisex piece, and quite stylish as well. The scale of the LED screen will vary amongst the two size headbands, one being considerably smaller than the other in order for it to fit on the 1/2 in. width.
The Mood Band specifically monitors and classifies your emotions by observing body language and vibrations  from your brain. The headband then compiles all the gathered information and determines what you are feeling, and then either displays it for people to see or one can press the 'Hide Button' and the band will release vibrations and magnetic waves in order to relax the facial muscles making it so that the consumer show any emotions through facial gestures and therefore people will not be able to have any insight in to what you're feeling.
The Mood Band will ideally be constructed out of resin and a mesh like padding. There would be a 1/4 inch cushion between two layers of thin resin, one layer being on either side of the resin.
Marisa and I decided to design and manufacture this product in in order for people to be capable of having more control over their display and projection of emotions and feelings. We have noticed that more and more people in today's society cannot fully express how they are feeling when asked, "how are you?", or "what's up?". We feel that these types of individuals should be able to control how they communicate their feelings and emotions to others as well as more control in the choice on whether to display them or not.

This is the Product Sheet for the Mood Band.

                                       Outside Pattern                                         Inside Pattern


                                    These are the product shots of our prototype Mood Band.

 

 

These are technical drawings and renderings of the Mood Band. They entail the exact dimensions of the product along with the appropriate scaling and proportions.

Brainstorming:

Product,

logo, &

Statement 

These are snippets taken from my sketchbook 

so you can get a little bit of insight on how I think and like, to work. 

Damir Doma SS 2010

The Garment that I chose to evaluate and describe is one from my favorite minimalist designer, Damir Doma. It is an elongated, exaggerated, blood-red cardigan with an oversized, 'drapey' hood. The cardigan features a small closure that provides the eye some movement in the garment in the form of an arrow pointing towards the right arm. The fabric of the garment seems to be a silk/cotton blend because of the see-through aspect, visible on the bottom left of the cardigan. The red resembles an almost 'deity-like' presence and the cut of the cardigan resembles something of what we know a greek god would have worn. The garment embodies oversized sleeves that fall at just the right angle into the larger than normal pockets which gives off a priest like aesthetic.
The garment seems to be synonymous with religion, possibly corruption, some form of deity, and of course the gods, be it greek or roman. There is a level of mystery within this garment. The garment may not entail so much intricate detailing, visually, but the cut, length, and color are a whole story in themselves.

(photo borrowed from the internet)