Stitched Leather 3D Sculptural Leather Form (Image by Hannah White)
Hannah White’s work aims to re-contextualise traditional hand manipulated textile craft techniques through her use of innovative materials and processes.
Her PhD proposal combines three-dimensional textiles such as hand stitching, pleating and weaving, with new materials, nanotechnology and industrial manufacturing methods.
Her research will contribute to the development of new architectural surfaces inspired by textile making processes and textile structures. She will explore the transition from ‘soft textile forms’ worn on the body, to ‘hard’ sculptural structures, for use in interiors and architecture, by ‘dressing buildings’.
Materials used by architects often have a ‘hard’ aesthetic. The recent interest in ‘soft forms’, partly as a result of computer aided design and digital manufacturing technology such as 3D printing, has initiated a change in the paradigm of architectural surfaces.
Cross-disciplinary collaborations with nanotechnologists and materials specialists will enable Hannah to build ‘textile’ forms from the ‘inside out’. This research will combine craft skills with material performance, creating structures with characteristics suitable for engineering applications. The research intends to provide designers and architects with innovative structural materials that can be engineered to meet the requirements of individual project specifications.
Hannah will engage with fashion and textiles archives, such as The Victoria and Albert Museum and The Royal School of Needlework.
Through the change of scale, material and context, Hannah aims to bring fresh perspectives to constructed textile techniques. The findings and designs generated by her research will aim to demonstrate the relevance that crafted textile forms can have in contemporary design and fabrication. This aims to generate a renewed value in the exquisite details and forms that can be made through textile processes, whilst bringing them to a new audience.