{ "title": "We are finalists of Hand & Lock's international embroidery competition!" , "date": 1692078888 , "content": [ [ "img", [ "project-handnlocktheprize2023-16-intro.jpg" ] ] , [ "p", "Founded in 1767, Hand & Lock are London's premier embroidery house providing embellishment services to the British Royal Family and a number of top European design houses. Every year, they organise the prestigious "The Prize", an international art competition to promote the fine art of embroidery. The competition strives to highlight the exquisite craftsmanship and skill that goes into this intricate craft and bring together the whole embroidery community to celebrate at an annual event in London." ] , [ "p", "We are extremely grateful that Yasmina has been selected as one of the six finalists of the 2023 competition." ] , [ "p", "The theme for this year's competition was Modern mystic arts and the power of colour. The brief highlighted the duality of science and spirituality and invited contestants to consider the formation of their art through the repetitive stitch in an almost meditative state, play with contradiction and semiotics, and explore digital and technology as extensions to the physical universe." ] , [ "hr" ] , [ "pb", "PART I - THE DESIGN" ] , [ "p", "This theme immediately resonated with our personal appreciation of zen buddhism, our love for nature, whilst striking our nerdy chord. We very quickly converged to the idea of a cyberpunk zen garden, in the form of an embroidered dress." ] , [ "img", [ "project-handnlocktheprize2023-01.jpg", "project-handnlocktheprize2023-02.jpg", "project-handnlocktheprize2023-03.jpg", "project-handnlocktheprize2023-04.jpg", "project-handnlocktheprize2023-05.jpg" ] ] , [ "p", "Buddhist zen gardens (枯山水, literally dry mountains & rivers) are made of very simple, natural elements. Rocks, sand, grass, a few plants. They are designed to perfectly mimic nature yet they are the absolute opposite of it: man-made, thought through constructions demanding a flawless execution to become a multi-layer source of enchantment:" ] , [ "ul", [ "At first sight they look like a beautifully simple, small scale reproduction of nature. Rocks emerge from the sand like mountains from the sea." , "Spend a few minutes observing, you will certainly succomb to the playful nature of the garden, walk around it, play with perspective and distance, enjoy the harmony of the composition, the delicate balance of mass and void and the skillful use of numbers and groups." , "Later, you might just sit and consider the contradictions between the irregular asymmetry of the garden and its controlled intangible geometry, between the static nature of the sand and its dynamic evocation of running water, between the garden typically enclosed in walls yet fully integrated in its surrounding environment, as if the nature outside and the garden inside were one." , "At some point, you realise that you have just spent the entire afternoon there, hardly moving, letting your mind wander across layers of significance, in a meditative journey." ] ] , [ "p", "After Yasmina got convinced that this would be the theme of our art piece, she needed to explore more. She read (again) everything we had on the topic, from Taschen's classic Japanese Zen gardens to the Sound of Cherry Blossoms and the Complete Works of Shunmyo Masuno. She revisited the photo library of our previous visits to Kyoto's Zen temples, and even explored Asian botany to build a list of typical plants used in both Chinese and Japanese gardens, with a particular attention to symbolism." ] , [ "p", "In parallel, she started exploring ways to boost the art piece with something unique and digital, anchored in Hong Kong's technological culture. Hong Kong being the mother of cyberpunk and the city of neons, she very quickly got interested in different options to include lights into the dress. It took a few weeks to finalise an embroidery method that would encapsulate lights at the surface of the dress, and deliver the effect she was looking for." ] , [ "p", "The design submission was due in early June, at the top of the wedding season. We miraculously found the energy to put the ideas together and submit Yasmina's design to Hand & Lock, just a few hours before the deadline... And suddenly there she was, selected out of four hundred candidates, as one of the six finalists of arguably the most prestigious embroidery competition in the world." ] , [ "hr" ] , [ "pb", "Click here for PART II - THE DRESS" ] ] , "author": "Yasmina VF" }