Illuminate Collective: Designing our leaflets

So in marketing we are still working towards creating our " unravelled" flyers and marketing materials. Simon came in with some drafts he had made based on our designs from last week. It was great to see them mocked up.

We had a lot of debate about which we liked. We all liked the design which used the robe as a background rather than one were there was only a section of the image. However we found it hard to decide on which shape we liked. We had a vote, which was tied, then discussed why people had chosen certain shapes, then anther vote, in which a few people changed their mind but we were still tied. After another discussion we eventually decided on the square shape as it was felt it was a bit different but to keep the image of the robe from the other design. Next we looked at the "unravelled" logo. Anna had bought some images she liked and Shuang ( from exhibitions) had also mocked up some ideas. We all like the idea of the logo looking like thread or the text containing thread in them. Here are a couple that Simon had bought with him.

Lastly we started working on the badges. We wanted to use the 5 key items in the exhibition and create fabric badges using a section of the design. The idea was that this could be used as targeted marketing to specific groups. We looked at photos of the 5 main items and looked at which sections of them it might be good to use.

Illuminate Collective: Where we are now... Marketing

The marketing team started work last week with Simon from Design Source. They started the session by looking at examples of leaflets and pulling out ones they liked, this could be because of its size, shape or particular things about it's design. We were all drawn to the same few designs, a couple of square leaflets, made in thick card with a glossy finish and some traditional rectangular leaflets which folded into three. We liked the square flyer as it felt different and the rectangular as it fitted with the idea we had had about making the leaflet look like one of the robes. We also felt there was more space in the rectangular leaflet for information. The next step was to have a go at designing, we had already chosen one of the exhibition pieces as our key item for the design. Simon showed us an example of a design he had done and how to illustrate on the paper where we thought text and images should go.

We set to work, playing with our ideas and designs.

After a set time we each presented our ideas, a couple of us had used the idea of a cut out in the design. Vicky had made a leaflet that opened like the robe and had a cut out around the neckline. Yafet choose a design with a number of folds and the rest of us created a variation on the square leaflet.

We couldn't decide on our favourite so Simon offered to mock them all up digitally to give us a better idea of how they would look. We also started thinking about the logo for the exhibition title "unravelled". Simon gave us the task of collecting ideas and examples of things we liked to bring with us next week. All in all a very productive session and exciting to see our ideas start to come together.

Illuminate Collective: Where we are now... Interpretation

So we've been working hard on pulling together all the different parts of the exhibition. The Interpretation team (Leanne, Amy, Helen and Stef) have been researching all the objects on display, finding out about their uses and origin as well as some interesting stories about how the objects came to be in the Museum's collection. The next stage was to take all the research and turn it into interesting and readable panels. The team had already decided to group together the items into a number of themes, they were... The stories and symbols with in the textiles, How the objects came to be in the collection, What the objects said about the wearer and when they might have been worn, Objects that we used for our animation project These also needed some snapper titles and a brief piece of information to go with them. We put out a brief for someone to work alongside the group who had experience of writing interpretation for museums and of working with groups of young people. We were very lucky to be recommended Amy Barnes who has worked with Leicester Museum's young people's panel and has an extensive knowledge of Chinese textiles. Amy is now working with the group to write up the text. The first task was to work on the titles for out themes, after a bit of a brain storm and thinking about the key messages we came up with... Symbols and Stories, Collecting China ??? (still working on this one!), Style and Status, and The Dragon and the Heavenly peach (which is the name of our animation) The group have now started to write the individual labels for the objects.

Illuminate Collective: Where we are now- Exhibition plans

So we've had a productive week looking at the Exhibition Lay-out and Design. We showed the plans to Russ, who will be making the cabinets and to Victoria, who looks after the collection, and apart from a few tweeks the plans have been o.k'd to go ahead. Our next job was to take our model box of the lay-out into the gallery space to work out if our plans would work in the space, it looks very different in a model box! Unfortunately the Castle closes at 4 during the winter so we had to go in during the day which meant most of the exhibition team couldn't join us. However Sophie from the team was free and came along as spokesperson for the group. Tris (assistant exhibitions officer) and Russ had given us a few things to think about when they saw our plans. The first thing being that our main motif was going to be placed in a corner of the Gallery between two doors, a space we thought would be hard to put any objects in. Both described that wall as dead space and said it would be a shame to have the main motif there as it may get over looked, also there may be a problem with objects being displayed over the radiator. This meant re-looking at our lay-out and potentially re-jigging it, once in the space as well, areas we thought were quite large suddenly looked fairly small and we had to re-think pathways through the show. After a slight moment of disappointment at needing to move things around we came to a solution fairly quickly. We still need to go over the plans with the rest of the group but think the new arrangement will make better use of the space whilst still keeping the original feel of the exhibition. The exhibition design in particular has had to have the most changes to it as we meet with different people in the museums and learn more about the possibilities and practicalities of putting on this exhibition. On a good note, we had bought a selection of paper lights into the space to see how they would look as additional lighting, and as a way to visibly lower the celling and make the space more inviting. We all decided they looked really good, particularly in clusters of different sizes. We just need to talk to the Museums about the best way to light them.

Big Draw Training

Some images from the training event "Big Draw, Drawing Together". The session was aimed at practitioners who use drawing with groups to have the opportunity to share their approaches and experiences as well as try out new ideas.

Paper outfits

Spent the morning in Charnwood Museum creating paper outfits for Artzone with 8-13 year olds. We had an all girl group who made tops and skirts using a range of techniques. Images of the end creations can be found here... http://www.flickr.com/photos/charnwoodarts/sets/72157628165048681/

The Dragon and the Heavenly Peach

Our animation is finished!

The Dragon and the Heavenly Peach from Illuminate on Vimeo.