The Little Black Dress - Inspired by Butterflies!

19th September 2011 - Butterfly World

I decided to travel to Butterfly World which is located in Stockton-on-tees to gather more knowledge and ideas for my butterfly inspired theme.

At Butterfly World you can enter a tropical rainforest where there were hundreds of different species of butterflies.

I was able to photograph lots of butterflies as well as cocoons, below I have added some of my favourite photographs which I had taken that day.

This cheeky butterfly situated itself on my top throughout my whole visit at butterfly world!

Metamorphosis 
There are four stages in the butterfly cycle:

Stage 1- Butterfly Egg
Stage 2 - Caterpillar
Stage 3 - Cocoon
Stage 4 - Butterfly


I am going to explore each stage of the butterfly cycle:

Stage 1 - Butterfly Egg
Butterfly eggs look as though they almost have pleated layers which i could possibly re-create when designing my Little Black Dress.

Photograph of Butterfly Eggs from google

My pencil drawing - photocopied and duplicated

While researching my project further I came across this book in the library called 'Pattern magic 2 - by Tomko Nakamichi'. I noticed the book because on the front cover is a really unusual structured shoulder piece which is very similar to the structure of a butterflies egg.

Scanned in book - 'Pattern Magic 2'

Here I have scanned in another page that displays how you make the shoulder structured shape.

Stage 2 - Caterpillar 

Due to the time of year, there wasn't any caterpillars that which I could photograph to collect primary research so I had to research online.
Looking at the structure of a caterpillar, it looks almost quilted with lots of layers which inspired me to create a tight quilted body con dress displayed in the photograph below.

I decided to look at a designer who created quilted designs and came across 'Just Cavalli'.

Just Cavalli created designs that have similar characteristics to caterpillars for instance the quilted leather which I then experimented with myself.

Just Cavalli

Below is an example of quilted leather which I have created:

Looking closely at caterpillars they are covered in fur and have tiny little spikes on their body - therefore relating to the fetish theme.
I am also thinking about studding my final design so I am going to add a sample of studs to my sketchbook:

I have added photographs of my Fetish Theme boards below:

Fetish Theme

Fetish Theme

I then moved onto the Third Stage of metamorphosis which is the Pupae (cocoon). 

Research in Sketchbook...

Photograph which I have taken at Butterfly World

I really love the silhouette of the Cocoon which is definitely an element I am going to use within my designs. Another characteristic of the cocoon which i discovered was the fact that some contained spikes - relating to the fetish theme. 

Pencil Drawing of a cocoon I created by observing a photograph

A few thumbnail sketches inspired by cocoons!

Chalk drawing of a cocoon

I then moved onto looking at stage 4 which is of course the transformation of a cocoon to a butterfly!

I found that my primary research which I had collected at Butterfly World really helped inspired me as it gave me lots of ideas to explore. 

This photograph below shows a butterfly unclose - I love the see-through almost plastic looking wings it has showing off the beautiful shapes that its wings contain. 

This is one of my favourite photographs which I had taken at Butterfly World!

The first idea that I came across was the idea of a harness (relating to the current fetish theme) or possibly creating a cut out garment. 

This is an actually carcase of a butterfly which I found at butterfly world - this is primary research that inspired me to possibly design harnesses or cut out designs

Concentrating on the cut out design idea - I came across the Burberry Collection 2011

I decided to include this collection due to the fact it relates to my butterfly photograph which I had taken.

This collection really inspired me in terms of fabric - I loved the plastic/PVC look and thought about creating a cut out design in shape of a  butterflies wing and then layering this fabric behind it.

Photograph of a metallic looking butterfly taken at Butterfly World! 

Another photograph which I had taken which really inspired me during this project - I love the jewel tone colours which the camera has captured.
I research the current Jewel Trends and also set out to find fabric which related to this butterfly - I was informed about a fabric called iridescence ( basically what oil looks like on water).
I am definitely going to use this fabric for my final little black dress.