On Monday 20th May, Year 12 Art and Textile students headed into London to collect first hand research from the Victoria and Albert Museum.
Students spent the morning exploring the expanse of galleries, recording information in support of their current projects and gathering stimulus for the beginning of their Personal Investigation. In the afternoon, they embarked upon a handling session in the V&A’s Sackler Centre. This gave them a valuable opportunity to handle and examine historical replica costumes of outfits worn by 17th century Spanish royalty. The handling session led the group to have many interesting conversations about the quality and cost of materials, the importance of zero waist pattern cutting, the handmade construction and embellishment of such garments and the incredible number of modular components that went into each royal outfit. Students were also intrigued to look at and handle the miniature garments made by students from the Royal College of Fashion, in response to 17th century costumes.
As well as collecting a wide range of research imagery from the V&A students were lucky to encounter a bit of London showbiz in Leicester Square as they watched Elton John and his entourage walk down the blue carpet of the Rocketman premier. Thank you to Mrs Bassett for accompanying the trip and to Mrs Nash for her early and late pick-ups from Darsham Station. We really appreciate it. A great day was had by all.