Fashion Design: The Portfolio Project

  The Portfolio Project is the process of basic design line building of your portfolio collection. There are three steps of line building: concept building, editing, and finalization. The Portfolio Project walks you through each of these three steps in each of the four segments of the portfolio—mood, color, textiles, and silhouettes—with demonstration photographs and think-and-do work.

Approaches to the Design Process


  Many people have the mistaken impression that being creative and being systematic in solving a design problem are mutually exclusive. However, a conscious, systematic, and orderly approach does not have to be linear. And even a basically linear approach can allow for changes along the way to the solution of a design problem.



  Take the time to evaluate the approaches to the design process that follow. Based on the book, The Universal Traveler by Don Koberg and Jim Bagnall, these are choices you, as a designer, can apply to the completion of your portfolio or any other design task. Koberg and Bagnall identify five basic approaches to creative problem solving:

1. Linear Process Step-by-step logical sequence; being cautious of not getting ahead of yourself. Well-suited to large, complex, team projects.
2. Circular Process Starting at any stage and advancing to the others in turn. Ideal for lengthy projects (like college programs, summer jobs, contracts, etc.).
3. Feedback Approach Moving forward while looping back to reconsider previous discoveries. Important when caution is imperative.
4. Branching Paths Allowing specific events and the interrelation of separate stages to control progress.
5. The Natural Pathway Awareness of all stages concurrently, but emphasis on one or two steps at a time; like viewing seven open boxes in a row, each one ready to receive additional data and thereby modifying your overall thinking accordingly.

  These authors compare the Linear Process to to a mule train, “with each unit responsible for pulling the one behind it,”and the Natural Way to a horse race, “where all units progress independently; where only one unit is ‘out in front’ (i.e., in focus) at any given moment.”

Organization of the Portfolio Project

  With the five approaches in mind, you’re ready to consider the organization of the Portfolio Project in detail.

A - Segments

The Portfolio Project is divided into four working segments, each with three steps. See the visualization and a further explanation in the box “The Four Basic Phases of Line Building.”

1. Mood

a) Conceptualize: work with free association.

b) Edit: use critical thinking and

the “Designer Filter.”

c) Finalize: commit the images to the page.

2. Color

a) Conceptualize: work with free association.

b) Edit: use critical thinking and

the “Designer Filter.”

c) Finalize: commit the images to the page.

3. Textiles

a) Conceptualize: work with free association.

b) Edit: use critical thinking and

the “Designer Filter.”

c) Finalize: commit the images to the page.

4. Silhouettes

a) Conceptualize: work with free association.

b) Edit: use critical thinking and

the “Designer Filter.”

c) Finalize: commit the images to the page.

The Four Basic Phases of Line Building :

  The four basic phases of line building—the mood, color, textiles, and silhouettes—are explored each time a designer approaches a new season. The phases are revisited many times during the design implementation, refinement, completion, and production of the line. The first ideas are hardly ever just put onto paper or made into a garment without refinement. During the revisiting, it is important to reference ideas in your sketchbook to see whether your initial concepts are going forward the way that you would like to—or the way that you envisioned them. You may have a new vision that does not match your designer sketchbook idea, but checking in on the idea stage before you finish the line can only help your portfolio images. The four phases are spelled out below in simple terms.

  Mood/Concept : The concept of a movement, or inspirational base.

  Color : The color story of the line, usually two to eight basic colors for each line.

  Textiles : A collection of fabrics that work well together for a line that meets manufacturing needs of yardage consumption. Usually two to eight basic fabrics per line.

  Silhouette : The shapes and actual garments for each collection. Usually the portfolio will have 8 to 16 ensembles per collection (head-to-toe figures  or croquis displayed in silhouettes).

B - Photos and Think-and-Do Exercises

  Each development step of the four segments is explained in how-to photographs of a designer performing the task at hand. And each of the four segments’ steps challenges you to create your portfolio images by undertaking the think-and-do exercises as you read through the text.

C - Materials

  The four segments and three steps are developed using the following materials:

• Previously completed materials.
• The Idealized Final Portfolio.
• The Designer Grid.
• Previously developed, ongoing work-inprogress materials.
• The Creative Chaos Sketchbook.
• Retail market focus reporting.
• Illustration, layout, and finalization evaluations.

  As you work through the segments and steps, you will link the four segments together in a portfolio page-flow story.