"I am a woman." | BrandNew part 2

Being a woman isn't considered a selling point within society. Being a woman myself, I often feel like I have to go the extra mile to prove myself beyond my aesthetics. I feel as though I am judged, and automatically presumed to be a tart or an air head, just for being a woman who expresses herself through her appearance. Of course, neither of these presumptions are true, and beyond my exterior I am so much more than what society labels me as. Yes I am a woman. And yes I am strong, independent, self-motivated, masculine and feminine; amongst other things.

I decided that my USP (unique selling point) is the fact that I do not conform to societies view of what a woman should be, and that being a woman shouldn't be a negative thing, as we are so much more.

Personally, I am fed up with having to explain myself and feeling guilty for enjoying feminine things. Why have I considered creating work hinting towards fashion a taboo? If that is my calling, then I should be allowed to explore that discipline without feeling guilty or being ashamed. Unfortunately, I have been told to feel just that.

As a personal response to this, I redesigned a Victoria Secret Pink bag. The original bag is a girly pink with white polkadots, that suggests that their consumers are girly, cute and fun. I chose this bag, as I wanted to show that women can be those things along with other characteristics that may not be considered appropriate for a female to have, and that there is more to us then our sexuality.

I chose to create a stencil to print the type onto the bag, as another one of my selling points is that I can create works by hand, and on the computer, as I often merge the division between Fine Art and Graphic Design. By stencilling the type with paint, the irregular print stimulates a stamp; I feel that this is appropriate as society 'stamps' and 'labels' women negatively.


I kept the exterior quite feminine but included masculine features such as the bold typography and the dominant use of black. However, inside it shows that I am internally more than just a 'woman', by clearly listing all of the reasons why through language.

Throughout this project I was highly inspired by the HeforShe campaign and the Guerrilla Girls - what they stand for as well as their branding/aesthetics. Both groups utilise a lot of text within their visuals to communicate facts and I feel like I wanted to take inspiration from that.

I used a lot of black, the HeforShe colour scheme and also the exposed pink from the VS bag, as I enjoyed having a shared masculine and feminine identity; while I also used bold, sans serif text.
I wanted the type to be quite masculine to juxtapose the femininity of the bag.

Overall I am quite happy with the final outcome.
It communicates that I am proud to be a woman and that it shouldn't been considered a negative as I can be both masculine and feminine, while exhibiting a variety of skills and unique selling points that I do not feel are specific to either gender. Unfortunately society likes to group and separate appropriate normalities for each sex, but I am proud to say that I do not conform to these stereotypes. This is my selling point.


Things that went wrong:
I didn't consider that the counters within the type would disappear when cutting out the stencil. 
The paint came out more red than blue-toned pink when it dried. 
The 'pink' paint left strong brush strokes and uneven coverage. 
I would like to recreate this by scanning in hand made elements and then finally creating the template digitally and printing professionally. 

Update: Since creating this bag, I have rendered a second version digitally and professionally printed the net in order to create a more 'professional' finish. I also embroidered feminine, lace knickers with the words inside of the bags to echo my concept. The embroidery machine would not stitch directly to the lace, thus I had to stitch the type onto another fabric, manual cut around each character and then hand stitch those onto the underwear. Almost all of these failed, expect for one: Woman.