Blog No 7: Research: Finding the heart of inspiration

In response to, and in support of, the first of this year's new workshops, I want to speak a little on the increasing importance of returning to ‘physical research’ as the foundation for design.

Physical Research: A pilgrimage to experience first-hand locations, objects, natural phenomena, and human stories; to touch, forage, record, and commune with the resources of your inspiration.

I have discovered so many extraordinary contemporary artists and storytellers on social media; the talent, breadth of creativity, and sheer craft excellence are an inspiration and, arguably, I believe, at an all-time high. However, the immediacy of information has, in many ways, devalued or even obliterated its currency. As I sit here listening to a playlist on Spotify, not realising my curated list of tracks ended ages ago and I am now unwittingly listening to its ‘recommended songs’ that all sound ostensibly the same as my preferred choices, I am reminded that the internet opens you to your every desire, algorithmically spoon-feeding you ‘choices’.

We once pored over artwork and design in galleries, glossy magazines, and books, where artists would received an elevated appreciation. My library at home is my greatest possession. But today, all too often, new works only get to be exposed on social media as a link in a never-ending scroll vying for attention—like a single sheet in a, well thumbed, giant roll of toilet paper…

How can you be free to create in this stifling climate? "It's all been done before" has never felt more real; as I create, I can view others creating, in real time, the exact same thing, or so it feels.

Pre-internet, thinkers were sparsely resourced by comparison to today's generationsof creatives that searched for inspiration with less accessible knowledge at their fingertips—or at least less knowledge of the thoughts, opinions, and processes of others. When you found a resource, there was an extraordinary sense of ownership that simply cannot exist today, when anything you find is, by definition, available in its exact form to anyone with a smartphone. Worse, we often receive the stats to discern how many have this information through likes, reposts, and relentless commentary.

During my time at Central Saint Martins (88–90), a London art school with a stellar reputation (now UAL, Central Saint Martins) in my field, I discovered a world so vast, so beautiful, that I was, back then, woefully ill-equipped to live up to its reputation. So much so that on graduation I left the art world completely for a while, preferring to work in the nightlife of London and cleaning caravans in the French Riviera, or selling doughnuts on the beaches, rather than put myself out there. I later discovered it was that life experience I was lacking; what was the point of creating if you had not experienced anything?

I was fortunate enough to attend John Galliano's first collection, "The Ludvig (Ludic) Game", back in 1985. Until then, I had no idea that fashion could communicate narrative, tell a story beyond wearables, or conjure emotion beyond aesthetics.

Galliano (who graduated from StMartins in 1984) is now famous for his use of narrative-based research, is a master of referencing and painstakingly in-depth fashion research. His observation of the mundane—such as the way someone smelt, the idea of "dressing in haste", or discovering how the "bourgeois gesture”—once unlocked emotion. His ability to turn an art movement, sub-culture, or luminary figure from history (real or imagined) into extraordinary conversations in detail, colour, texture, form and feeling is unrivalled.

Thirty years on, I am still teaching design at my old alma mater and my design work continues to roll with the changes, ever searching for a foothold in the "now", while working with the next generation to forge a path to creativity that services the needs of today while encouraging them to utilise aspects of those same storytelling tools learnt from the great masters.

So, when you next search for inspiration, I implore you: instead of sitting at your computer reading articles, watching memes, doom-scrolling, or simply dragging JPEGs into a little blue file, pick up a sketchbook and a camera, pack a lunch box, get on a train, and go see something profound and meaningful. Spend time with it, walk, develop a relationship, and record it in multiple personal ways. Record the sounds, notice the smells and tastes, photograph every aspect, take notes, and make observational drawings (crude or sophisticated). Chat with people; take objects back home as mementos. And then, if you must, Google it… After all, is the intention of research not to find inspiration?

* The bourgeois gesture

A way of capturing through cutting or styling the blasé movements and signals associated with mid-century bourgeois fashion mentality and approach to the art of dressing.

* Dressing in Haste

Looks you can come up with when not conscious — dressing in the dark, leaving very early in the morning, or taking the dogs out for a walk. You grab whatever was lying around and start layering it up, and presto, there you go.