J.Larkowsky Illustration

Spring 2012 Couture week starts Tomorrow! Legendary Houses such as Chanel, Dior and Armani (Plus some new-comers like Giambattista Valli) will present their hand made collections in Paris over the coming few days. 

To Celebrate this, I decided to draw some of the gowns from the Givenchy Haute Couture Fall 2011 Show. Pretty!

One of the ‘Rules’ that makes a dress Couture is the fact that no machine is used in the creation of the garments. This first dress, a Golden tasselled dress was completely embroidered by hand. The craftsmanship is insane on these dresses, it blows my mind the power of the human hand. 

Being a completely sheer base, I applied the Flesh-tone after the watercolour and before any other elements, so not to smudge any of the detail. 

                        

This second dress demonstrates Creative Director, Riccardo Ticci’s brilliant mind. This is a fully embellished sweatshirt, thrown over a column gown. Layered pearls and beads create the ‘crustation’ type ornamentation’s on this dress, as well as beautiful folds of fabric accentuating the hips. 

Although alot of the craftsmanship in a Couture garments comes form decoration, I still kept the drawings quite loose and free. The fine-liner gives the illusion of heavy embellishment without going into the extreme detail that is actually featured on the dress. 

       

This dress was crazy. My drawing does not give the dress any justice. Thousands and thousands of Hand cut organza circles, in various sizes (No Bigger than a 50p Piece) were hand layered and sewn in an intricate pattern all over the dress, accentuating the models hips, breast and waist. A ‘Normal’ gown in Haute Couture would take over 400 hours to complete a team of seamstresses. 

As I said, this sketch really does not show you the amazing layers of material, almost like scales, running across the dress. It was just beautiful. 

         

The final dress was one of my favourites from the collection. A swimming-costume type bodice, in full lace, with cold-sholder sleeves and cut out around the waist. The skirt was then appliqued with mirrored lace segments, engineered to the body. Fantastic. 

I love drawing lace as I have no hope of getting it like the actual piece, so Its just made up of random squiggles and lines, which I try to mirror. The final look gives the impression of lace, without being overly fussy or precious. 

I am very exited to see what the designers present over the next few days, and im sure some will be featured on my blog very soon! 

(All Illustrations Copyright)

So, I warned you. Marchesa madness has hit Larkowsky HQ. I have really fallen head over heels for Georgina Chapman and Keren Craig’s Spring 2012 Show, and produced some of my proudest drawings to date. 

 

I shall start with the Sketches.

And here are the real garments. 

1: First up is a fully fringed number.  This dress consists of silk fringe, draped over one-another, contouring the models figure. The movements of the dress are insane, swaying and swaging as the model swayed down the catwalk.

I first mapped out the fringe with pencil. Then after a light white watercolor wash, retraced with tippex, then with fine-liner (Which made the dress too heavy and black), so then back over with the tippex. 

This drawing was kept really simple and elegant, as the dress was just so beautiful, really emphasizing the models figure and the dancing fringe at the bottom is quite mesmerizing. 

2: The second look is a corseted pencil dress, with sheer embroidered overlay and flounces, which fall to create a pool of ruffles at the back of the models frame. 

Drawn in my typical style, this dress features watercolor, tippex, fine-liner and silver pen for the embroidery.

I emphasized the rules quite significantly more, to give the sketch some more impact. This dress is so elegant and it really shows some of the wonderful craftsmanship Marchesa sport throughout their collections. 

3: The third sketch is my favourite out of the four. A beautiful tulle fully embroidered dress, with an almost sheer chiffon overlay, that falls into inky blue handkerchief drapes, creating a full skirt made of multiple layers.

I really had to think about how to draw this dress. 

 I started off with the watercolor base and flesh tone, but mapped out the embroidered underlay first, filling in the detail with the tippex and fine-liner. 

I then went over the full chiffon overlay with the same two materials, t get a real sense of the exquisite layering of the dress.  This collection was full of beautiful ethereal dresses, but this one is just so amazing to watch glide down the runway.

4: This dress is quite similar to a Chanel Spring 2012 dress I had sketched previously. Layers of dusty pink ruffles, layered over one another, draped around the hips, completed with a pencil skirt in the same colour.

The colour of this dress is really beautiful, so after getting the right watercolor mix; it just seemed to fit into place, with the normal tippex and fine-liner accents.

This is a really great dress, the detail is really beautiful and its paired really nicely with the vibrant pink hair of model Charlotte Free.

Marchesa’s dresses are always so elegantly serene and very surreal at the same time. They are almost Couture-like garments shoing true skill and beauty.  So once I have started, I really wont be able to spot. More Marchesa to come!   (All Illustrations Copyright, All Images Style.com)