Alice is a textile designer specialising in print with a multidisciplinary and experimental way of working. Her work is driven by an absorbing interest in surface and materials. Bold, graphic use of colour and material coming together thus, the fabric itself becomes part of the print. Alice combines sailcloth and ripstop nylon with other outdoor, sport fabrics such as fleece and scuba. She employs varied techniques such as mono-printing, screen-printing using stencils and then reassembling, bonding and stitching fabrics together to experiment with the form and tactility of the fabric.

Alice’s research documents the sail cloth in a variety of ways. The object documentation shows the grid patterns, stitching, seams and patching. The colours green and blue have a recurring significance throughout the project- prominent in the nylon nets, the plastic fishing containers scattered along the marina. The royal blue of the spinnaker and the forest green seams with white zigzag stitching become part of the aesthetic of the drawings, colour palette and are further developed into the materiality and pattern development of the final fabric.

Alice gained insights from book entitled ‘Radical Matter’ where it highlights designers using social design practice. The book reflects upon the possibilities of connecting communities together and quotes ‘materials and making are tools and processes that can bring people together.’ Alice’s vision is for workshops to bring families together in an economically deprived community, passing on traditional techniques linked to place and creating cross generational activities to engage participants with the approaches of traditional communities and sharing skills.

Alice worked with a balance of both digital and hand rendered print designs which made the print development process more interesting and versatile. The use of block colour in her digital designs provides a tool to visualise the layers for block printing onto the fabric. Part of the research explored nautical knots, looking at traditional techniques of knotting and the way in which this linked to the place and community. Alice incorporated rope and cording as a 3D graphic embellishment. The rope is attachable and able to be threaded through the fabric in different ways, the final fabric is adjustable by the relationship with hands and the rope.