Project

Weaving Fabric for Suits

Client

Franz Schmidt

Location

Oslo, NW

Category

print

Year

2015

Team

Theo Ford, Jonas Topooco, Daniel Olsson (Research & Development)

Whilst working at Research & Development I worked on the design and photographic art direction for Franz Schmidt 'Weaving Fabrics for Suits', developed within the Norwegian Artistic Research Programme at the department of Art and Craft at the Oslo National Academy of the Arts. The catalogue is published as part of both the exhibition with the same title at Oslo Kunstforening March 13 — April 19, 2015. The book presents Schmidt's research study in mapping Norway's forgotten textile production from the past: the factories, the tools, the materials, the designs, the production methods, the economy, the history, the people. 

Franz Schmidt's research focus was reviving and re-purposing forgotten weaving techniques from Norwegian fabric manufacturing. This resulted in many field trips visiting abandoned factories, and collecting an archive of objects and process journals with which to inspire his own designs. We decided to organise this information visually, via arranging the objects by colour in one long line, and photographed them from above in a continuous stream. After which they were laid out full-bleed across the pages of the book, interspersed with written reflections on the development of the project.