Project Description

To Make Locally | 本地製造

Description:
T-shirts may be the most recognised form of art by popular opinion. The huge demand has pushed collaborators like on-demand fabrication powerhouse TML Apparel Limited to continually innovate in this realm. Through state-of-the-art digital printing technology, they try to eliminate overhead costs associated with traditional printing methods, acting as an accessible platform for local artists to distribute their creative works. This transforms a T-shirt from an article of clothing, to a blank canvas for self-expression and human subjectivity.

In this collaboration, Erica Yip used her graphic design to campaign for her belief in the ‘maker movement’. The term represents a trend in product design where designers leverage technology to create high quality crafts or batch designed products. It promotes the fundamental values of beauty, uniqueness, human interaction and the appreciation of hand crafted products. The graphic design features jumbled characters of the terms ‘MakerToday’ and ‘ItechFactory’, further encouraging people to rethink their dependence on technology, in both a good and a bad way.

The collaboration with Mantha Mok centres around her graphic work ‘City’. It is an abstract scene of the city, which is based on a vague impression of her dream. She couldn’t recall the specific silhouettes in the work but instead chose to express the urban atmosphere with abstract lines and palettes of pastel colours.

Savoy Cheung’s graphic design ‘Fruit Boys’ employs an innocent illustration style to portray the perfect ‘Mr. Right’ in life. The two illustrations feature an apple-head humanoid holding a guitar and an orange-head situated in the library. Her depiction draws the connection between the healthy lifestyle of consuming fresh fruits and people’s desire of picking the ‘perfect boyfriend’, and further symbolises how the discussion around the sexes can be objectified like fruits in real life.

With the strong commitment of Collaborator TML Apparel Limited “To Make Locally” and co-create, it offers full support on production and technology to the emerging young design talents in Hong Kong. In materialising their concepts into customised digital printed T-shirts, the design young blood has gained an invaluable opportunity to put their creative works and characteristics on show, whereas the companies also got a better understanding on the youth mentality and trends.

在主流觀念中，T恤可能是最具認受性的藝術品。人們對其需求極大，促使合作夥伴如按量製作市場巨頭TML Apparel Limited和街頭服裝品牌Nothing Ugly在這個領域中不斷創新。通過最先進的數碼印刷技術，他們試圖消除與傳統印刷方法相關的間接成本，作為本地藝術家宣揚其作品的便捷平台。此舉將T恤從一件衣服轉變為可以用來表達自己和人類主觀思想的白畫布。

在這次合作中，葉穎綸利用她的平面設計來宣揚她對「自造者運動」的信念。該術語代表了產品設計的趨勢，設計師會利用技術創造出高質量的工藝品或批量設計的產品。它促進了美容、獨特，人際互動和手工製產品鑑賞的基本價值。作品以「MakerToday」和「ItechFactory」這兩個術語為特色，進一步鼓勵人們重新思考他們對科技的依賴，不論是從好的還是壞的方面。

TML Apparel Limited與莫晚華的合作項目圍繞著她的平面設計作品「城」。這是一個城市中的抽象場景，它源自她對夢境的模糊印象。她在作品中無法回憶起夢中的特定輪廓，於是選擇用抽象的線條和柔和的色調來表達都市氛圍。

張芷楓的平面設計作品「水果男孩」採用了一種天真無邪的插畫風格來描繪生活中完美的「真命天子」。插圖畫有一個拿著吉他的蘋果頭人形機器人還有一個位於圖書館的橙頭人。她的作品將選用新鮮水果的健康生活方式與人們挑選「完美」男友的願望聯繫起來，並進一步象徵了圍繞兩性的討論如何像現實生活中的水果一樣被客觀化。

有賴合作夥伴TML Apparel Limited「本地化」和共創的堅定承諾，它能夠為香港新興的年輕設計人才提供了全面的生產及技術支援。在將他們的概念轉化為定制的數碼印刷T裇時，設計行業的新血已經獲得了展示他們的創意之作和特點的寶貴機會，而公司也對年輕人的心態和他們中間的趨勢有了更深入的理解。

Design Graduate:
Cheung Tsz Fung, Savoy
Mok Man Wah, Mantha
Yip Wing Lun, Erica

Collaborator:
TML Apparel Limited

Email:
savoycheung@gmail.com
mokmantha@gmail.com
erica.y.pd@gmail.com

School:
The Hong Kong Polytechnic University 香港理工大學