Helen Elizabeth Nichols

 

'I Can No Longer Hold Your Body' emerges from a study of hand-lettering through filet crochet to code messages of care, solidarity, and connection with the working class. It responds to a design industry that continues to devalue artistic labor while encouraging competition over collective support. These works inhabit space as a counter-practice to conventional typographic norms, challenging the corporate drive to streamline, commodify, and dilute creative expression.

Approximately 15,500 squares and 150 hours of work make up the piece, and it measures to approx. 5ft x 5ft. Helen Elizabeth Nichols

Helen Nichols graduate show for  MDes Communication Design explored textile lettering.

My practice explores care, communication, and resistance through textiles and typography. Rooted in a lineage of skilled laborers, caregivers, and quiet advocates, I approach design as both a craft and a political act. I work with tactile materials like tufting, crochet, and fabric to reframe protest as soft, slow, and intimate.

Below: Hi

Willow Shedden

Willow Shedden's beautiful soulful graduate collection, 'Corp Fearainn', Gaelic translation of body of land. 

The beauty of things never designed for arts sake. Through the growth of industry we have lost our connection with community and land. The garments we wear, beauty in the labour and process. A life of slower practices. 

It’s the physicality in how we do things. 

The final four look collection was 

molded by the feelings distilled through 

photography; 

the atmosphere and emotion created in 

one still image. How narratives are created 

and nostalgia is evoked. This creates a desire 

to design this same reaction 

through clothing.

Serenity and solitude. 

Willow Shedden

Ellis Yuille

 

Ellis Yuille's GSA graduate collection included knitted denim, soft, thick durable and textural. 

My collection is a celebration of inclusivity, individuality, and self-expression through the power of oversized clothing. Designed to create a sense of mystery around the body, the silhouettes encourage freedom from the constraints of traditional fit, allowing wearers to embrace their own shape without judgment. Each piece invites the wearer to choose how they interact with the garment―whether worn loosely draped or cinched to contour the form―offering space for personal interpretation and playful self-styling.

Crafted from a dynamic combination of denim and knit to replicate denim, the collection presents a visual and tactile collision of contrasting materials. This clash of textures serves as a metaphor for the rebellious, boundary-pushing energy rooted in street culture―a subculture that thrives on resistance, creativity, and self-made identity. By working with second-hand denim, surplus yarns, and repurposed materials, I embrace the raw, DIY ethos of the community, reinforcing the idea that fashion can be both expressive and resourceful.

This collection is designed for everyone―regardless of gender, size, or background. It champions full expressionism, inviting each wearer to style, interpret, and move within the garments in their own unique way. With fluid silhouettes and adjustable elements, the pieces are intentionally non-restrictive, allowing the wearer to feel empowered, seen, and entirely themselves. It is not just clothing―it’s a canvas for individuality. Ellis Yuille

 

Emilia Evans-Munton

Emilia Evans-Munton's degree show was an incredible, monumental sock monkey appearing to be left behind by a giant, measuring 18 metres.

          Remember I’m Still Here (2025)

"The piece is an ode to the toys that are left behind, and the painful pang of loosing one’s favourite toy as a child. It lies there in sun, wind, rain and storm; initially pristine, gradually becoming more battered and bruised by the weather, literally having been left behind by the artist, yet discovered by the audience during the duration of its presence at the art school. As well as appearing to have been left behind by its previous owner, the sculpture also appears to have been dispelled from the building and the degree show itself by existing outside, without shelter and vulnerable to the weather. For the sculpture to exist on such a large scale, to take up so much space outside of the school nods to the feeling of rejection of craft qualities in the art school.

The love for the soft toy, is shown through the disfigurement it attains from play. The more bashed and deflated a soft toy is, the more it has been loved; a beautiful paradox. The interaction from the audience allows the rediscovery of  their love for their once favourite toys, all the while showering the sock monkey with a newfound love. The scale of the toy reduces adults to a childlike scale, sparking play and wonder amongst onlookers. Maybe it hasn’t been left behind after all."

Below: 'A new friend'