The piece I have created is a fashion garment in the style of a ball gown/prom dress. This garment was chosen after creating 8 different designs and then expanding, allowing existent influences in my work to be portrayed in this piece. I preferred this garment compared to my other designs because it would allow me to expand my knowledge of fashion and textiles and open up a lot of new ideas I could add. The original piece I chose was plain burgundy underneath a black lace skirt however I thought this was quite plain. I compared my designs with some of my other art pieces including my fine art painting and 3D sculpture and decided that it wasn't elaborate enough for the style I enjoy to use which is often abstract. To create a modern look to the dress I designed a lace up front which is a style of clothing myself and a lot of young females like to wear at the moment. 

When researching different artists, I came across Elsa Schiaparelli who created a fashion piece alongside Salvador Dali. This dress featured a painted lobster on the front which was hand painted by Dali. This fashion piece made me think outside the box with my design and allowed me to come up with a creative way to make it more interesting. I decided to feature a lion painting on the front of the skirt which would be the main focus of the design. I decided to do the lion painting as they are my favourite animal but also have great meaning behind them. The strong, brave, proud and family orientated side to a lion is how I would want other people to see me and means a lot to me.  

Once I had my final design I needed to find what materials would work best for my garment. I chose to use lace as I feel it is a sophisticated material. For me, I feel that with a sophisticated gown shows independence and power as a young woman, allowing my message of the strong and proud person I am to shine through. I needed to find a material that would work well with fine art materials. To do this I took a piece of organza and did a couple of tests including fabric paint and fabric pen. I compared the overall look and effectiveness alongside which will be more practical for this piece and decided that paint would be the better option. As I had practiced these on organza and it had worked quite well, I decided to go for a material similar. The material for the skirt I decided to paint was quite a thick cotton allowing me to dye and paint without ruining the overall durability of the material. 

Originally the garment was supposed to be a one-piece ball gown however this was going to be quite complex. With me having a deadline to meet I decided to adapt my design creating a one piece of lace and a separate skirt underneath for the cotton material with the lion painting. Due to this being my first try at creating a fashion garment as a ball gown I decided that changing my design slightly would benefit me greatly when meeting the deadline. 

There have been many difficulties along the process of making the ballgown. The first was that originally when I went to buy the lace there was only 2 and a half meters left which may have not been enough. As the material was a limited-edition piece I decided to get it anyway and see if it was enough, luckily it was. The second is that I originally made the garment to small. To try correct this I decided to unpick a couple of the seams I had created however this still did not allow enough material for the garment to fit correctly. To allow the dress to fit I needed to add some extra panels at the front, which I cut out using my original pattern piece and lined with cotton. I added these to the front of the dress over the bust area which gave me enough material to fit round me properly as I had designed. Another difficulty I faced was during the painting of the skirt, as I leant across for more paint I knocked over the dirty water pot which spilled across my skirt. The painting has covered a large amount of the water stain however it is still noticeable. If I was to do this again I would definitely keep all things that can spill away from my work. 

I feel that the painting on my garment is definitely the strongest part on this piece as it is the main focus. The lion painting creates a bold statement allowing my inspirations and identity to come across well. I feel that I executed the sewing as well as I could with the time frame given and how little I know about creating a fashion piece. To create shape to the back of my dress I created two seams going almost vertically downwards. These two seams have created quite an interesting shape and style to the back which I like quite a lot as it gives the garment a new structure.