When you meet Georgia Loveridge you would be forgiven for assuming she is your usual 21-year-old London-based Textiles student, living and learning at UAL's Chelsea College of Arts (one of London's most renowned Textiles art schools).
But it is only when you go on to chat with the young student that you realise the level of enthusiasm - and talent - she has for the art medium she works with. Working predominantly with digital printing of fabric creations in exciting textures and bright colours, Georgia's work champions STITCH style: it's fresh, diverse and inspired.
Her talent is such that fashion power house Louis Vuitton (menswear team), actually ended up buying one of Georgia's designs. "It was a good moment," she modestly describes.
So what inspires Georgia's unique designs? "Contemporary and post modernist art," she says. "But interestingly I also love the more retro too, like 50s architecture and interiors, and family photographs from the 60s and 70s."
"I chose to study textiles because I felt comfortable in that specific medium, and I've always enjoyed translating art work onto fabrics. I really like the idea of being able to wear art - with all the thought process, inspiration, and craftmanship behind it."
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| Some of Georgia's work |
Georgia works as a digital printer, layering different brightly coloured fabrics together in different cuts and shapes before digitally printing her work. "I'm often working in quite a 'flat' way," she says. "But I love collage and layering up different materials to get a mixture of textures, which I then develop into these digital prints."
As any artist, however, Georgia is always striving to improve. "I think I have just become more sure of my own way of working, so slowly my designs are becoming more refined and achieving a better final outcome - I used to really struggle with this part of it!" When questioned about the future, she reveals the likelihood of a possible shift into another expression of textiles: "I can see myself moving more towards interior textiles rather than fashion textiles."
As previously mentioned, Miss Loveridge had unexpected success when some of her work was sold to the menswear team at Louis Vuitton, an achievement that she ranks as her proudest artistic moment yet. "I was so proud and pleased with it. I feel the colour combinations came out really well, and Louis Vuitton must have agreed too!"
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| Georgia's work that was sold to Louis Vuitton's menswear team |
I decided to drop in the ultimate STITCH bombshell and seek Georgia's opinion on the future of textiles. This blog so far has focused primarily on diverse and exciting new ways to see textiles (and fashion) as art, and Georgia's inspired digital textile prints are no exception to this rule - challenging the usual expectations of how textile art should look (and a far cry from the image of knitting and stitching that the word "textiles" usually evokes!).
"I think textiles have - and are always - evolving, much like fashion design itself," she says. "I think innovative textiles are needed for the fashion industry to make clothing exciting."
"There are always aspects of fashion that definitely act more as a work of art than actual wearable pieces of clothing. Couture pieces would be the most obvious display of that! Just like pieces of art they go for thousands, so there's not really that much of a difference."
Whether you like her innovative take on textile art or not, there's no denying that Georgia's work is very different, bringing new and fresh ideas to an evolving medium. Her inspiration only confirms our belief that art students really are the ones to watch. Aside from the obvious - they are students, learning new things and are the artists of tomorrow - today's art students are working in the most exciting time for their field, a century when barriers have been broken down and the rules around what art can and should be have been redefined. The most unique ideas are emerging all the time, and Georgia sits proudly amongst the throng. Her marriage of the old medium of textiles, with a very modern technique of digital printing, puts this unique twist to her work and signifies her ability to keep up with the 21st century art pace.
It is for this reason that STITCH - and Louis Vuitton - think you should watch out for Georgia Loveridge. Her digital prints could very well be seen inside your house in years to come...
FOR MORE INFORMATION ABOUT STUDYING TEXTILES AT CHELSEA COLLEGE OF ART, click HERE
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