Newstead Live - Alice in Wonderland
- Nov 1, 2022
- 5 min read
Updated: Feb 17, 2023
Nov 1 - Nov 28, 2022
Introduction
This was a live design project with Newstead Abbey.
'What is live project?' I asked.
It's a project that's active, 'in use' in the real world (at the time)
For this project we were separated into small groups of five. The project's aim was to develop our ability and understanding what designer for stage and screen do and how they work, collaborating to generate ideas to illustrate narrative with excitement, imagination and originality.
The artefacts produced by us in collaboration with our peers during this project were displayed at Newstead Abbey as part of the Christmas celebration. The intended audience were children with their families and other interested visitors. The tone needed to be light, fun, fantastic and inclusive. The exhibition was seasonal, for Christmas entertainment.
Brief
Our task was to design and create an installation as part of Newstead’s ‘Alice In Wonderland’ season.
To achieve that we would need to use narrative, telling the story. Our design could've been literal or abstract. It was crucial to keep in mind how the audience would view the installation/s.
In our groups we collaborated to:
Gather and share appropriate research and references;
Decide upon a group approach and concept.
My teammates for this project were:
Oliver Bateman
Abbie Arnold
Study visit
We visited Newstead Abbey on October 5, 2022.
During this trip we were able to explore all the rooms and halls, get inspired by architecture and interior design details as well as catch the general feeling of the place.
Architecture
The Abbey met us with stunning gothic architecture in front and beautiful architectonic details all around the building/s.
Interior details
Abbey greeted us with beautiful interior elements all around, the only thing needed was attentiveness to details around us. My favourite parts were all the beautiful wallpapers that had eye catching patterns and beautifully drawn flowers.
Garden
Newstead Abbey was surrounded by beautiful garden and park from all the sides. I took photos of some details like broken bench, plants and trees that could spark my imagination for further idea generation.
Let's begin!
During our first session, we got divided into teams and before our group work could set off we had a few very important topics to discuss. We created two mind maps 'What makes a good collaboration?' and 'What things to consider?'.
*Mind maps written by black marker were created by our tutor Kerry, after class discussion when every group had chance to share their thoughts on the matter.
Some of the principles of good collaboration:
Task division;
Equal effort;
Compromise;
Help each other learn;
Stay in touch;
Ask for help.
Some of the key ideas to consider:
Skills set;
Budget (50£);
Space + Movement;
Available fixtures (can't drill or create any new ones);
Time scale;
Transportation.
Research
After having discussed how to create successful teamwork, we were ready to begin our research.
Some of the elements that we gathered:
Roses and rose bushes;
Illusions;
Stripes;
Playing with scale;
Tea;
Doors, keyholes;
Signs;
Anthropomorphic creatures.
Idea generation
Next step in this project was to finally get started on idea generation. Every chat with my teammates was very intense, we were coming up with idea after idea, and then inspire each other even further! At that point I started writing everything down and sketching, so all that talking wouldn't go in vain.
Concepts that I came up with (some inspired by my team, some by location):
Portrait that has roses growing from it;
Model of Wonderland that is covered by vail to symbolize ephemerality of Alice's dream;
Rose bush wall with little characters all around;
Stained glass art piece from acetate.
Key Idea
My groupmates - Lissie and Ollie came up with an idea of creating diorama inside of an old wardrobe that was located in Newstead Abbey's bedroom. After some discussions, we decided to settle on this concept. From that moment on we continued adding details and depth to it.
After I heard this idea Love, Death & Robots episode 'Ice Age' (2019) instantly came to my mind. In this episode a couple finds out that there's miniature civilization in an old freezer. So I thought to myself that this pretty much is what we want to create - little world, where visitors of the Christmas exhibition can look into.
Each of us went our own way to see what could closet diorama show to visitors. My proposition was - snow filled wonderland and some scene playing out in the foreground. Here's a moodboard that I created for this concept.
At first we didn't know how wardrobe looked like inside, did it had empty space, clothing rack or shelving? I created two ideas that could work in two different environments.
First, diorama for shelving would be set in horizontal box. Second, elements would be hanged from clothing rail, but still creating foreground and background.
First models
For the first idea I created little draft model to convey the general idea better!
Ollie created layered model from Kristjana S. Williams illustrations. It helped us set our minds on etching, engraving texture.
After some thoughtful consideration we decided to show croquet scene. Here are some of Lissie's research sketches.
During this stage everyone choose a task to do/create:
Me - Character illustration, (presentations);
Ollie - Models, building;
Lissie - Small bits and bobs, mushrooms;
Felicity - Trees, plants and shrubbery;
Abbie - Colour research and background.
Boxes, Structure
More models
The moment we received wardrobe measurements and in detail photos from Adrian, Ollie started sketching out ideas how our insert would work and look like.
There were models from foamboard, mountboard as well as ones created in SketchUp.
Building
Me and Ollie worked together in the workshop to create inserts. Those were couple of fun hours, where I learned new and practised existing skills.
Finished result:
Character Design
I choose to illustrate main characters - Alice and Red Queen, as well as some key scene details like flamingo and hedgehogs. I was very happy and excited to design this part of our installation.
Inspiration & Research
To create thoughtful design I created loads of mood boards and carried out big visual research to support myself and my process. First of all I tried to find as many as possible portrayals of Alice, Red Queen and Croquet scene by other artists. From that I could understands what's missing there for me and which niche can I take up.
During my research, I found out that there have been BIPOC Alice's. It spoke to me, because I believe that representation matters so much, especially to kids! And I would have loved to give opportunity to any kid imagine themselves as Alice in my work.
Another step was to determine character outfits! I felt like it was an important step, as clothes and accessories are at least 70% of the image we see.
For this I created quick collages combining pieces that I previously found.
I wanted to portray Alice close to Victorian fashion, but at the same time utilize modern believes therefore I decided to give her culottes (pants). She's an adventurous kid, so it must be more comfortable to run around Wonderland in pants rather than skirt.
For Red Queens look I was majorly inspired by drag queens, their dramatic makeup and hair looks. Further, I searched for puffy dresses and corsets. From all the previous Wonderland media, I was sure that I wanted to use this dramatic renaissance collar also called ruff.
Sketches
With my illustrations I wanted to create opposites.
Alice:
Soft shapes;
Blue tones;
Playfulness.
Queen:
Sharp, angular shapes;
Red tones;
Strict, angry.
During sketching process, my awesome classmate Abbie helped me with references by posing for me! Here are some of the images that I took. Metal ruler was used as an alternative for croquet mallet.
Final Sketches
When final sketch was finished, I scanned and photographed them so I could continue with outlining everything on Adobe Illustrator. Next step was creating texture. For that I created separate mood board with examples of etching and engraving for inspiration, that was huge help while rendering my own textures.
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