The Royal College of Art’s Work-in-Progress exhibit presentsstudents’ projects at the half-way point of the academic year.The School of Material encompasses students from theprograms of Ceramics & Glass, Fashion Menswear, FashionWomenswear, Goldsmithing, Silversmithing, Metalwork &Jewelry, and Textiles, yet intriguingly reveals concurrenttrends and influences across the disciplines. Stylesightreports on the key themes to emerge from the exhibition.

Emma Sheldon’s intricate and delicate pieces involve preciseincisions into painted card and wood. Complex geometricpatterns layer over one another to create an intriguing opticalillusion among reflective surfaces, fish scale-cut wood anddelicately striped diamonds reminiscent of Bauhaus-eratextiles.

Eleanor Irving has used similar cutting techniques in her piecethat juxtaposes the iconography of American football jerseyswith luxurious goat suede and gold leaf stripes. Irvingintended to instill a stretch quality into the non-stretch fabric,creating a slouchy, easy-wearing garment. Gold leaf stripes,salmon skin and shagreen appliqué add a luxurious edge to atraditionally casualwear garments.

Woven textile designer Ailar Berdyyeva is working with color,light and the layering of yarns to create a collection of fabricsthat are both weightless and bold. Silk organza, ceramic-coated yarn and Lurex have been woven in two or threelayers to create transparent yet strong fabrics that offerintriguingly intense color combinations.

Moa Gullmarstam explores reflective surfaces and the opticalpatterns created by the resulting light and shadow plays.Ceramics & Glass student Shelley James has worked withprint and glass to create illusions of depth and movementwithin her moiré patterned works.

Ceramic & Glass student Sorsha Galvin’s work exploresceramic pieces that are astonishingly lifelike in theirreplication of skin. Delicately painted ceramic pieces recreateundulations of skin and cartilage, bringing to mind thoughts ofbody alterations and plastic surgery.

Yiru Wang’s work re-creates human skin in a very differentway – solid bulbous mounds of flesh seem deceptivelymalleable, leaning against one another and spilling fromperspex boxes. Cocoon-like shells are rendered in naturaltones of nude skin and seashell shades, referencing afascination with human and natural forms.

Moira McAulay and Xiao Li have both been tacklingtransparent knits within their projects, but in very differentways. Moira McAulay has created self-supporting knittedstructures, inspired by concrete architecture. Compositionsincorporating light yet strong polyurethane and plastic yarnhold possibilities for interior surfaces.

Womenswear knitwear designer Xiao Li’s work exploressilicone knitted yarns that stiffen and seem to gelatinize edgesof garments in an intriguingly modern way. Li has combinedthis development with printed fabrics that featurephotographic images of her drawings placed over knittedfabrics.

Three glass artists have been working with trapping materialsor patterns within glass, creating surprising results. MonetteLarsen’s work sees trapped prints from nature printed onenamel and encased within layers of glass, while SheilaLabatt’s pieces seem to encapsulate frozen moments in timewith inky washes of paint encased within solid blocks of sodalime furnace glass.

Livvy Fink’s spherical glass works seem at once cellular andgalaxy-like. Her pieces exploit the impressions made whenhot molten glass mixes with the solidity of cold glass. Finkwanted to extend the medium of glass beyond its existenceas something that is simply looked through by exploring depthand volume in the material.

Designers across the textile department have been workingwith knotting yarns and ropes for end products ranging fromjewelry to knitted garments. Emily Watts plays with scale andtexture to produce a macro-scale British wool knit that reflectsthe time-consuming craft required in its making.

Yijin Zhang instead works with more traditional scales of yarn,winding rope and sealing lengths with resin in her explorationof many different materials. Anna Wilson in contrast has usedhistorical knotting techniques in her pieces that use rubber,cotton yarns and silks contrasted with bent sections of copperpiping. The materials used in her jewelry pieces reflect herinterests in the contrasts of nature and materials in the urbancity.

Ceramic designer Cristina Vezzini produces lighting piecesthat mimic nature, from berry-like spherical shapes to crocusbulb and leaf forms that emit a low, glowing light. Vezziniintends to explore connections between the material bonechina and the immaterial light, and the relating parallelsbetween the visible and invisible natural world.

I Liang Lu’s more traditional ceramic forms of bowls andsaucers explore the idea of growing forms through porcelain. Luwas inspired by the sight of moss growing between pavements,and the notion of a sense of harmony between man and nature.Three different types of sponges – natural, cellulose and loofah– are dipped into porcelain slip to add texture to the ceramicmaterial, creating a sense of biological growths in and aroundLu’s delicate ceramic materials.

Lucy Birley’s color-washed silks re-imagine floral textiledesigns for the twenty-first-century. Birley zooms in on thetextures and color of florals, painting print pastes and dyesdirectly onto silk and capturing the essence rather than adirect translation of flower forms.

Mixed media textile designer Kaoru Ishii’s pieces concentrateon the textures, folds and pleats of traditional Japanesetextiles. Ishii has created richly textured three-dimensionalsamples, often left in their raw state or dip dyed in darkcharcoal or indigo dyes. Ink washes fade in and out ofsaturation, creating Rothko-esque gradations of color.

Textile and fashion designers alike are creating 3-D tactiletextile surfaces that employ differing traditional crafttechniques. Rhiannon Williams is inspired by folk mythologyand narrative, juxtaposing complex embroidery techniquessuch as Irish embroidery, tufting, appliqué and beadwork onwool, mesh and plastic knit.

Knit designer Maria Ressario Garcia combines macro-scaleknits with intense sections of fabric collage in her garmentideas for Womenswear. Forms and textures from nature haveinfluenced the work of fashion designer Katherine Roberts-Wood, who applies hand-gathered silk velvet pieces to ametallic lace coat. Roberts-Wood looks to electronmicrographs of different organisms to inspire the form andtexture of her work.

Menswear and womenswear designers are collaging differentfabrics within garments, with unexpected compositions of patternand texture. Nam Jung Choi has worked with ready-madeproducts such as dishcloths and curtain hooks, and appliquédthese to a rich brocade, alternating flat expanses of color withintense pattern and decoration.

Fiongal Greenslaw’s Men’s coat features many differingpatterns and textures of rich luxurious jacquards, working withtraditional patchwork techniques combined with geometricpanels contained within a curved silhouette. Textile designerTali Furman’s collections of prints are composed of carefullyproportioned color and texture collaged together in carefulcompositions. Furman has worked by manipulating andscanning images before over-printing by hand.

Students at the RCA are exploring different new materialcombinations for use in interior spaces. Textile designerGemma Waggett’s works combine textures such as PVC,wool, vinyl, rubber and MDF within her two- and three-dimensional collages.

Jonathan Wade’s bold sculptural pieces are intriguing in theirscale and material use – strange bulbous shapes emergefrom a resin-soaked boulder, while a stereo speaker appearsfilled with grit, creating the feeling of other-worldy objectsmade from unknown materials. In contrast, Jelka Quintelier’s“portable chair” is made from traditional wood and copperjoints and nails, yet is fashioned from pieces of chairsdiscarded from the streets of London.

Textile designers are also exploring how to combine hard andsoft materials, such as industrial metals and Perspex withknits and woven fabrics. Bethan Jones uses industrial wastematerials to create forms that could be applied to architecture,product design or furniture, and has encased specificmaterials within plaster, such as foam, metal, plaster, andplastic.

Yang Zhao is similarly interested in creating pieces for interiorspaces, and is trying to make three-dimensional functionalknitted structures. Working with plastic, resin and Lycra, Zhaois trying to create potential surfaces for interiors inspired byarchitectural structures.