For a weekend catch up with my best friend, we decided to go to Cambridge for a day of shopping and seeing the city.

We decided to hit the shops and stop by Topshop, Warehouse and others. My favourite pieces of the season is anything embroidered. Bags and jeans espically! 

The city is very pretty, we stopped by Christ's college to look at the beautiful buildings and have take photos. 

 I wore my coat from Top Shop, an oversized leather dress which I brought from Top shop on Oxford street a while time ago, I decided it was a piece for longevity because it is  good quality and simple, it can be styled up or down and is leather so it is very durable! I paired this up with a cute choker from Topshop black tights and Embroidered boots (currently at Public desire!).

Buys from Topshop! A beautiful embroidered bag and satin feel nude pink frill top!

We really enjoyed our visit and will be back soon!

 For lunch we stopped by an independent cafe at Stickybeaks. We enjoyed yummy lattes and quiche, the staff were very friendly and the cafe had a home made feel to it, even the water was a vintage style glass water dispenser, we were made to feel relaxed and happy. I loved the detail to the coffees!

JoJo

For this blog I am reflecting upon what I have learnt about the differences between two models of Stoll ( power knitting machines ) CMS 530 HP multi gage and the CMS ADF - 3

The CMS 530 HP multi gage machines work quite like a dubied in terms of how the feeders are selected and move. The carriage of the machine has an overhead which pushes the feeder holders. The carriage also transfers the needles for the fabric shape and stitch structure.

 Pictured in front of the staircase of Albion with Anson.

The CMS ADF - 3 machines are newer models which have more yarn feeders than the CMS 530 HP. The CMS ADF - 3 also feed through the top of the machine instead of through rollers on the side. For this reason the CMS ADF - 3 has sensors which tells the machine to stop if there is an obstruction. 

It also works differently in terms of selecting feeders to knit. The carriage doesn't do this, it is the bars over the machine that have motors inside that carry the feeders across the bed to knit. The carriage runs across the machine to transfer needles.

JoJo

Before starting my second placement, I went on a week holiday to Lanzarote! Forget the bad reviews on the island and visit the beautiful parts of the island. We stayed in Playa Blanca and also visited the Marina for dinners. The Amura - a Michelin star restaurant is spectacular, the interior and exterior is beautiful, the building with white pillar balconies and white decor serves food beautifully presented with very pleasant waiting staff. It is a dinner to remember.

I decided it was the perfect evening to wear my beautiful Miss Selfridge dress.

The embroidery of the dress has been crafted in India, inspired by antique Japanese Kimonos. It really is a special piece that had been designed to celebrate 100 years of Vogue! The dress is super exclusive, they only had 100 pieces made.

JoJo

For the last five months I have been on part of my placement year working for The Albion Knitting company. 

Albion knitting based in Harringay London, is a high end knitwear manufacturing company, with clients such as See by Chloe, Alexander McQueen, Givenchy and more.The company fits in the market whom want 'made in Britain' clothing and it's amazing for the designers in London to have the factory on their doorstep.

The factory's interior is more than just a factory, it is a beautifully designed interior space, the entrance of the building has a sculpted stair case using knitting needle beds on each step and connecting wire frame. The company has offered me many skills to learn and develop in all the departments including Quality controll, machine sewing, hand sewing, pressing and knitting (operating stoll machines).

I have seen stoll and Shima Seiki machines in use and have learnt to design swatches on Apex 3 at Nottingham Trent which is great for a student to have the opportunity to have designs produced on machines that are used in the industry. By choosing The Albion Knitting Company as my placement year I have learnt a great deal about the stoll machines, their maintenance and servicing, how regularly everything needs to be checked, cleaned and oiled. I have learnt how to change the machines needles and for the fabric quality importance of tension which is regularly checked and adjusted on the machines.

I have learnt how to read and resolve problems which is indicated by the orange light above each machine and will stop knitting when there is a problem.

By watching the machines I have also learned and understood more how the machines work and from this I have worked out and asked questions to understand the differences between the different knitting machine models. 

Besides the operating screen (which will also tell me there is a problem with a feeder). A light on the feeder will tell me which feeder there is a problem. This saves quite a bit of time which can be used to look after other machines.

The needle bed needs to be oiled once a day to make sure the machine flows well and to keep the machine from rusting. The brushes also require a generous amount of oil as these bush under-neigh the carriage to oil the under-neigh of the carriage.

During my time at Albion we had a visit from Shima for an introduction to the Apex 3, a programme which we use at Nottingham Trent on the Knitwear course. It can be used by both designers and programmers to realise the design and make sure it works before handing to the programmer to give less work and more chance of the garment being successfully knitted, this cuts time and costs as there are more problems being resolved before the sample is made. As you can see in the image above there are two of each sample. They looked identical. It was only when I touched the samples that I could tell one was knitted and one was only a digitally simulated sample using the Apex 3. 

In the machine sewing department I learnt how to use new industrial machines these are the button hole and button sewing machines. Normally on my own garments I have either knitted a button hole using partial technique or at university the technician will use the button hole machines and buttons will be hand sewn onto the garments. 

There are many different types of button hole stitching and adjustments to be made with scrap fabric of same or close as possible handfeel of the garment sewing onto. Then once the quality is perfect the button hole will be sewn onto the garment.

I was amazed at the speed of this machine, the button has to be in exactly the right place or the needle will hit the button and break.

I look forward to writing and sharing my next blog.

Any questions I will try to under in comments under-neigh! 

JoJo

To see more images and about the company visit their website at http://www.albionknit.london/

Starting 2nd year of the Fashion Knitwear Design and Knitted Textiles degree at NTU, we have been introduced to the Shima programme that is used to design Knitting. This can then be processed into the Power Knit machines. I am really enjoying using the industrial system.

Power Knit Machines.

First week back at university!

Lectures and briefings ready to start the term, it's an exciting year. Our course has 17 new students, 3 are exchange from New York who will be leaving before Christmas and the others joining are direct entry or transferred from textiles at Nottingham Trent.

During first week we also received an email about the collaboration of our course with WGSN. Before the Summer holidays, Tutors and students submitted samples to respond to a trend of S/S 17. I feel very privileged for one of my samples to have been chosen for inspiration for one of the trends. There were many successful beautiful samples, I can't wait to see these samples inspire garments of S/S 17! People signed up will be able to access the Nottingham Trent University Future Trends PDF through the WGSN website sorry I cannot personally share with you.

http://www.wgsn.com/en/

The year ahead is looking exciting!

We have currently been set to decide upon a Live project (A project with industry) from Next, All Saints and Acorn.

http://www.next.co.uk/

http://www.allsaints.com/

http://www.acorn-swatches.com/

These companies will give a presentation at the university about the briefing. It's an exciting new step on the course to be working with industry! Whilst working on our project we are also applying for Placements to 'fill the Sandwitch' of our Sandwich Degree. This just means after second year you will go on placement for 36 weeks or more to achieve a Diploma of Professional Practise. To assist us in choosing the placement thats best suited for us (and a placement we can afford) we will be watching the 3rd Years presentation about their placement year. This will enable us to understand what the placements expect from us, where we will be living, if we need and how we get visas, what they gained from the placement.

This year the course seems far different than last year. We now need to build research from Trends and collate a Shop report, building upon design that already exists and not just making something because you we it. The main aspect is to aim for a target market.

Tomorrow we have more lectures then Thursday I am planning to go back to the Frameworks Knitters museum to practise knitting and using the lace bar.

All for now!