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Friday 13 September 2013

DESIGN - Yumiko for Chinti and Parker

Before coming to intern at MillaMia I spent 6 months at the beginning of last year as a Design Assistant interning at Chinti and Parker. I really enjoyed my time with them, and was thrilled to be involved in the AW13 collection.

About Chinti and Parker
Chinti and Parker are a British womenswear fashion brand launched in 2009 by cousins Anna Singh and Rachael Wood. In their own words, their mission is - 'to create beautiful, ethically made garments that value style on par with substance. Super-soft fabrics, flattering cuts and a palette that combines key neutrals with fashion-conscious colourways and prints has become the brand’s blueprint, providing the building blocks of the perfect capsule wardrobe.' They pride themselves on producing garments from ethically sourced fabric and with a keen eye on environmental concerns so that each piece has a tag stating it's provenance - whether produced within the EU, fairtrade or from organic materials.

As well as an online store - Chinti and Parker can be found in many high end stores across the UK and abroad. A list of these stockists can be found here, but excitingly their latest AW13 collection can also now be found in Selfridges. They have a beautiful and informative blog too - which can be found here.


My design process
As part of my work for Chinti and Parker I researched colour, silhouette, texture of knitwear and made a moodboard. Creating the moodboard was one of my main roles and from this I then designed some ideas for them based on it. I was given colour swatches for AW13 and played with silhouette and details with these colours such as oatmeal, moroccan blue and taupe. From my research and moodboard they chose the ideas of  flourescent colour, block colour, geometric motif and large square pockets.

I am interested in the idea of using details of menswear in womenswear and the elbow and shoulder patch design elements are the main inspiration for the circle sleeve jumper. I put circles on the front of  the sleeves instead of under the elbow to make it more unusual and added the shoulder patch to create balance with the elbow patches.



The end result of all of my design work, the Circle Sleeve Sweater (retail £295) is a simple, stylish sweater which is easy to wear yet retains a feeling of understated luxury. The colour block elements are a subtle way to add a small bolt of beautiful colour without excess.

I was so pleased when, as a thank you present, they let me choose one of the jumpers that I designed and sent it to me - so I now have my own Circle Sleeve Sweater!
(posted by Yumiko)

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