What Colour is Gender? A Collection of Surface Pattern Designs.

The Final Major Project of my degree is a collection of gender-neutral surface pattern designs, both digitally and screen printed with the addition of hand-embroidery and embellishment.

The inspiration behind this project is the notion of gender neutralism and play. I was not only interested in how colour is so often ‘gendered’, with the stereotype of blue for boys and pink for girls, but also the notion that we lose our sense of fun and creativity as we get older.

“To stimulate creativity, one must develop the childlike inclination for play.”   This quote by Albert Einstein inspired me to use children’s wooden toys to create my initial drawings, from which I took the key shapes and lines to develop repeat patterns using collage.

The final designs challenge these common perceptions of colour and gender, whilst having a fun and bold aesthetic inspired by play, hopefully encouraging our sense of play to be re-found.