Belsay Awakes is a £6million project delivered over three years, aiming to transform a visitor’s experience at Belsay Castle, Hall & Gardens. For the second and last year, TICE was given an opportunity to be a part of the transformation. By doing so, we have created four Belsay-inspired creative projects for students to be involved in. Let’s take a look at what they have created.
Fashion: A Feeling of In-between
Mentored By: Jennifer Barrett – Fashion Mentor
Project Contributors: Anya Zuyeva – Digital Product Development at SPRUCE INT, Los Angeles, CA., Karol Severin – Senior Analyst and Product Manager, MIDiA Research, London.
The Brief:
This project is about students mixing the past, the physical present, and the digital future of a historical venue of their choice – resulting in a beautiful avatar fashion metaverse outfit.
They created an outfit that would feature in the Belsay Hall, Castle & Garden’s newly imagined metaverse. They would suggest ‘a scene’ that the venue could create as part of their metaverse offering to new audiences.
With this project, students explored the numerous fashion trends that Belsay Hall may have witnessed over its lifetime and then catapulted their imagination into a virtual fashion future. They imagined the scenes of the past, took inspiration from the stories of the venue and stepped into a virtual world.
Project Results:
Please view the final results of the students’ work from Cardinal Hume Catholic School, Durham School, Ponteland High School and Duchess’s Community High School and Boldon School.
What did the students think of their Belsay Awakes experience?
Please tell us your chosen project and why you chose this one
“I chose this project because I wanted to improve my skills in Fashion Design and Character Design, and understand more about the wider scale of fashion and its influences on the new Metaverse.” Erin Leithead, Consett Academy
What was your favourite part of the project?
“Researching my time period for my mood board made me learn things I would’ve never known if I hadn’t done this project, and I discovered some amazing history that I won’t forget”. Leni Middleton, Cardinal Hume Catholic School.
Was there anyone or anything that inspired you on this project?
“I was inspired by the architecture and atmosphere of Belsay Castle and Gardens, which gave me a base style of what I was going to build my final design on- I think basing the project around a historical location really gets ideas flowing!” Erin Leithead, Consett Academy
“yes, the way that the history of Belsay had to be incorporated within the designs of certain aspects. It helped me to understand how to include aspects like this in other pieces of work. Also, the architecture of the building inspired me to think about how this aspect could be incorporated into my future creative design.” Suzy Shanks. Ponteland High School.
What do you think you will take away from doing this project?
“I think I’ll take away many skills: working with a mentor, being able to learn and adapt your designs to new findings and overall, more about the world of fashion and how it is changing like the upcoming metaverse.” Lily Boyle, Cardinal Hume Catholic School.
“I think I will take away from this project my new knowledge of fashion and design skills, along with the inspirational trips and fun experiences we all had!” Erin Leithead, Consett Academy
What do you feel you have personally achieved in completing this project?
“My understanding of how the creative industry works, and the processes that projects and outcomes go under to become the final result that is presented has really grown and helped me think about what careers I may undertake in the future.” Leni Middleton, Cardinal Hume Catholic School.
“I have personally achieved a better understanding of the fashion industry and how the product is developed, new skills for working with others and I have bettered my time management skills.” Lily Boyle, Cardinal Hume Catholic School.
“I will take away many aspects. The main things are confidence and time management as I chose a project that most of my friends didn’t take and I had to use my time wisely on top of school.” Millie Buck, Cardinal Hume Catholic School.
And finally…
Thank you and well done, not only to the students but to the teachers and staff at Cardinal Hume Catholic School, Boldon School, Ponteland High School, Duchess’s Community High School, Durham School and Consett Academy. A big thank you to Melanie Hills and Helen Klemm and the team at Belsay Hall, Castle and Gardens, English Heritage and the companies that have supported and contributed to this project and to the TICE team that plugged away at the project week after week.
To the students – we hope you have enjoyed this project, we hope in years to come that you can proudly present an industry written project you did and quite frankly smashed. Well done and congratulations from everyone here at TICE.