DI: What is the main principle, idea and inspiration behind your design?
ZII : The inspiration comes from an emblematic photograph by Bernie Boston taken during an anti-war demonstration in 1967, showing a young man placing flowers in the barrels of riot policeman’s rifles. 1967 was also the year of the Summer of Love, flowers were omnipresent symbols of love and peace, worn in the hair and painted on faces and bodies. I took my inspiration from the flowers as a symbol to express the idea that even with all today’s negative emotions, there are more beauties to see.
DI: What has been your main focus in designing this work? Especially what did you want to achieve?
ZII : Nowadays there is a lot of negativity in the world where they got different subjects. The flowers, as a natural element, gives us more positive energy, and encourages us to be peaceful, love each other as well as respect each other. That's why I decided to incorporate them even more in everyday life.
DI: What are your future plans for this award winning design?
ZII : Making samples and pieces for the home sector as well as the fashion.
DI: How long did it take you to design this particular concept?
ZII : Around a month, cause this design its one of the pieces of a bigger fabric collection with the same concept.
DI: Why did you design this particular concept? Was this design commissioned or did you decide to pursuit an inspiration?
ZII : It was just an inspiration that came to my mind and I felt good about it, at that moment there's no hesitation to bring it into life.
DI: Is your design being produced or used by another company, or do you plan to sell or lease the production rights or do you intent to produce your work yourself?
ZII : I only have done the sample printing for myself and I need to think more about it, but I will be open to any kind of offer.
DI: What made you design this particular type of work?
ZII : It could be the main idea and concept, accompanied by other designs aspects such a composition, colors…etc and the way those aspects are interacting between themselves.
DI: Where there any other designs and/or designers that helped the influence the design of your work?
ZII : Absolutely unaffected.
DI: Who is the target customer for his design?
ZII : The home sector as well as fashion.
DI: What sets this design apart from other similar or resembling concepts?
ZII : It's the message and the feeling transmitted by design itself.
DI: How did you come up with the name for this design? What does it mean?
ZII : The name also comes from the source of inspiration and it was a slogan used during the 1960s.
DI: Which design tools did you use when you were working on this project?
ZII : Sketchbook, pencil, color pencil, markers, Adobe Photoshop
DI: What is the most unique aspect of your design?
ZII : The way that design represents itself through the main idea. The contrast of the darkest part represents the negative subjects in the world but the whole design composition has more bright and vivid colors, which represent the positivity that will conquer finally and will grow even more with newborn flowers.
DI: Who did you collaborate with for this design? Did you work with people with technical / specialized skills?
ZII : I did it without any collaboration.
DI: What is the role of technology in this particular design?
ZII : As I used adobe Photoshop, it gave me the ability to modify colors, layers, repeating style, and the composition easier and quicker. If not, doing all those processes by hand could be very time-consuming.
DI: Is your design influenced by data or analytical research in any way? What kind of research did you conduct for making this design?
ZII : The first part of research began through searching among the floral tendency of 1960-1970 trough the history lectures to understand and going even more deeply into those years conditions and then comparing the situation with today’s world. The second part comes from the SS 2020 Fashion theme and color trend which I found a common theme that was the symbol of my inspiration.
DI: What are some of the challenges you faced during the design/realization of your concept?
ZII : The challenge came in the early stages when I wanted to decide about how to express my emotions and transmit my idea through the piece.
DI: How did you decide to submit your design to an international design competition?
ZII : Honestly, they reach me through my personal website and their Email encouraged me to submit for the competition.
DI: What did you learn or how did you improve yourself during the designing of this work?
ZII : Through the challenges that I had for expressing myself and my emotions, I needed to analyze many things and break down even the smallest part of the design to get clarity of what I wanted to show and the best way to achieve that.
