Folded Fabrics...

My Final Project for my foundation diploma is about how textiles and 3D objects interact and influence each other. My initial idea was to observe how fabrics naturally make 3D shapes through draping and folding. I did a few initial sketches looking at folded and draped fabrics.

From these initial thoughts I decided it would be interesting to look at fabrics that are purposely folded to create 3D shapes. Taking inspiration from using sheet materials and folding into origami I decided to try this out with my fabric, using traditional origami shapes and instructions to apply to my fabric.

Using origami wasn't all that successful, folding the fabric worked much in the same way as folding the paper, I purposely chose a relatively stiff fabric which was starched shirt material. However to keep the folds in you had to iron the fabric. Each time I wanted to make a new fold I accidentally ironed the other folds out. Not too bad for initial research but I don't think I will be carrying this idea forward.