The End of The Met

Well, the end of the Met Collaboration anyway.

On Monday we did our final presentations to the Metropolitan Police about our redesigning of their uniform.

In the ’smart, new, fully equipped presentation suite’, (a classroom with a fresh lick of paint, some new furniture and some pretty good IT equipment that no one knows how to use), a room I didn’t know existed until that morning, we were faced with several officers in formal uniform, of varying rank, some people who were just described to us as ‘investors’ (in who I’m not sure), and several people from the Metropolitan Police Uniform Department.   As you can imagine it was pretty daunting.

And as you can probably guess from the lack of enthusiasm I have shown when writing about the project, I wasn’t particularly prepared.

But I had to go first, and had prepared a very basic powerpoint presentation and some notes for each slide, which I totally abandoned and decided to wing it.  I do tend to work better that way.  I know my work, and can talk about it quite easily.  Notes just scare me even more.

After finishing mine I sat through everyone else’s.  There were 5 presenting from my course, all having done the woman’s uniform, and then 2 groups from the Menswear degree.  The Menswear presentations looked a lot more impressive than ours, as there were about 4 in each group they had done the entire uniform, whereas we had only made 1 garment each.  Which was a little unfair.

When all the presentations were over lots of journalists and reporters were there to document the event.  Which was totally bizarre.  Like I said previously, the Met have used this PR very much to their advantage, however this time they got it a little wrong.  After the good couple of hours we spent doing filming and photos and interviews and things, the election for London Mayor won, and there was pretty much no coverage on TV or in the news papers.  Not the best week to have organised it.

But anyhow.  After a stupid amount of waiting, we returned, and stood in a huddle at the back of the room.  The Met decided to give a Womenswear Winner and Runner-Up, and then a Menswear Winner, (no runner-up as there were only 2 groups).  A girl called Jude Cunningham won the womenswear prize, for trousers with an adjustable height waistband and movable pockets.  Much deserved because she really problem solved the issues discussed with the police.  And another girl called Alice Burkitt and her group won the menswear prize for their fluorescent cape.  Which I must admit was very cool, and very amusing.  Though I must admit I can’t see police officers liking it (which is proved here, and if the commentators on that sight think that ‘fashion students’ enjoyed designing their uniform, well they have it rather wrong), it was clever.

So after that they needed a Womenswear Runner-Up, and that was me.  For a stylish jacket and a good presentation.  Which is cool.  They wanted designs that solved problems for the winners, and basically all I did was make a pretty jacket, but they liked the design, so that was nice.

Anyway what all this means is that that project really is over.  Which is a relief.  And I can now focus on my current project, which I am determined to make light of and enjoy.  And am so far succeeding at doing.

But more about that another time.