Design pilot in Nome Municipality - A hidden treasure and a life´s work
In Nome there is a well known knitting designer with an art industry and goldsmith education from the 70´s, Irene Haugland. She has designed more than 1000 patterns, and former been employed by Dale, Bik Bok and Vrikke. Her designs are famous, more famous than herself. We consider the designs as a hidden treasure and started to collaborate with her last year.
Design meeting: Test collection. From the left: Project manager Marit Svalastog – Nome Municipality, digital designer Heidi Jensen – Superlativ, knitting designer Irene Haugland.
Since it is very expensive to produce knitwear, we wanted to test if the designs are suitable for other products. She made a selection limited to animal motifs and called the collection “The wild life collection”
The combination of the digital design bureau Superlativ and the designs from Irene Haugland has now led to a test collection.
In a short time, an adjusted version of the collection will be ready, and a market survey will be done. Do people want knit motifs on t-shirts? What other products might be relevant? And who can sell the products? A number of questions need to be clarified.
If we succeed in commercializing the products, we have a wealth of possibilities in the form of new collections based on her designs. And it would have been fun to see an "old" designer rise from the ashes and get recognition for the great work she has done. She calls it her life's work.
We in Interreg Cupido/ KRAFT have applied for money to the test collection from the local industrial development fund, and had the project management so far.
