We were originally given the assignment to learn our partner’s fears and then choose one to create a wearable object that represents that fear. My partner was Nana and the fear that I chose from her was the fear of unintentionally hurting someone. She told me this story of her and her ex-boyfriend that she feels represents her fear the best. They were dating and did so for about 9 months, but Nana didn’t really actually like him the way he liked her. Nana felt guilty about it however so she didn’t say anything all that time they were together. Finally she found the courage to break up with him and luckily they are still great friends, but she knows that even though she didn’t want to hurt her ex, she did when they ended their relationship.
Inspiration from Nana
Prototypes
Now, when I started to think about a wearable object that represented her fear I realized it was a bit harder than I had first imagined because her fear is not exactly something one can see physically, like arachnophobia. She did give me some inspiration through other artist’s work, but I definitely still had my own work cut out for me. So I went through ideas about how I could display Nana’s fear and it struck me that most of my ideas came about because I feel that Nana’s fear comes from someone or several people unintentionally hurting her. So with this thought in mind I decided my wearable object would not only warn other people about Nana’s potential to hurt them, but it would also protect Nana from other people getting too close so she doesn’t get hurt as well. In the end I landed on the idea of a cloak that has spikes to ward off other people but which are also protecting her. The spike motif is continued on the edge of the cloak where it is cut zig-zagged to look like spikes as well.
Actual Cloak
Another important part of the cloak is the colors that I used to make it. Each color has it’s own meaning: dark blue was Nana’s ex-boyfriend’s favorite color, black is Nana’s favorite color, red is a color often associated with love which is at the heart of Nana’s fear, white is a color that both Nana and her ex liked, and gold and silver are colors that remind me of metal, which is really strong and used for armor like my cloak is trying to be. And that is the Cloak of Invulnerability.
My favorite part of my final project: the spikes of the cape made with thick origami paper and ink
