This major project-design report presents the final stage of an ongoing journey on the revival of traditional embroidery making in Cyprus. Raising awareness and researching solutions about the issue of the traditional crafts getting lost, this project will verify that traditional fiber arts in Cyprus can be revived and adjusted in personal style or lifestyle of the contemporary Cypriot.
A prototyping workshop was organized for young people, to revive the image of Cypriot traditional crochet designs. In this workshop, the participants are required to interact with a traditional craft maker to create crochet jewelry.
GOAL
- Raise awareness about the issue of the traditional crafts getting lost through time. Motivate young generation to be familiar with craft making by involving them in craft prototyping workshops.
OBJECTIVES
- Research the contemporary handmade jewelry sector as an example on how to design jewelry prototypes.
- Design a prototyping workshop for young people who are not familiar with fiber arts and with the assistance of skilled craft makers will be able to participate to the workshop.
- Design craft pieces that combine traditional skills with modern influences.
- Grow the market for traditional crafts by creating new markets with contemporary craft outputs.
WORKSHOP PROCESS
INTRODUCTION
The participants were introduced to a number of international crochet jewelry books as well as crochet jewelry market places online. By getting a glimpse of what is going in the area of crochet jewelry the participants started to have some ideas on how they would design their jewelry.
EXPERIMENTATION
Key element for a jewelry making workshop is to provide a variety of materials. Colorful beads in different styles with a variety of scrap fabric and satin ribbon could be part of crochet jewelry. To make the workshop run effectively, I asked the traditional crafter to create some different crochet shapes, and color threads for the participants to have ready and embellish on. All materials were supplied for the workshop and were available, for the participants to experiment and have fun with the jewelry making process.
REFLECTIONS ON THE SOLUTION: WORKSHOP
This workshop opportunity enabled me to express my personal concerns about this project and find the possible solution to achieve my personal goals as well as the project’s. The extensive research on the Cypriot traditional crafts sector in comparison to the international traditional and contemporary crafts sector led to a successful workshop outcome.
By observing the process and taking advantage of the opportunity that the traditional crafter was my mother, made the process an everyday experimentation for myself wanting to achieve the best results for this project. I did not choose to follow a specific design methodology for the workshop process, just to make the participants feel free to design whatever they would want. The workshop space was fully equipped with any sort of jewelry making supplies and found objects from my personal collection.
CO-OPERATION
Aim of the workshop was not for the participants to learn how to crochet, but to interact with the traditional crafter and form a craft output.
CRAFT OUTPUTS
The prototypes were not designed to be the perfect outcomes for this workshop, other than to be the beginning of crochet jewelry prototyping workshops. All craft outputs combine traditional crochet making skills with contemporary touches of materials like beads and scrap fabric.
REFLECTIONS ON THE OUTCOMES: CRAFT OUTPUTS
Jewelry prototypes were hand made by the workshop participants. Crochet work included colorful crochet shapes, which were inspired and created by the traditional crafter as the foundation of the piece that was going to be produced later. The traditional crafter worked as the main facilitator in the whole process. That enabled her, to navigate the process to the desired outcome. The participants were taking advice from the traditional crafter and were incorporating their ideas of how to design their piece according to their skills. Some of the participants did not even have basic skill of sewing so, there I had to step in and give a hand or give some advice for color coordination.
The craft outputs that were created were part of a range of fashionable jewelries and accessories for women. The participants incorporated their sense of style, fashion and skills into their designs and created unique products.
