Glossary of terms

 This post is a glossary of useful terminology. It will help me build up my specialist language in the area of fashion design.

            DESIGNING AND PLANNING

FLAT / FLAT SKETCH / FASHION FLAT

    A 2-dimensional sketch usually done in black and white with accurate design details such as stitching, trims, etc. Flat sketches are sometimes filled with colour or patterns to show colourways in your tech pack or for presentations.

fashion flat

TECH SKETCH

    A flat sketch with text callouts to specify various design details.

tech sketch

COLOUR STANDARD

    The exact colour that you’ve picked for your design that’s used as a benchmark (standard) for all productions.

COLOURWAY

    A product in a specific colour.

TECH PACK

    The instruction manual to create your product (like a set of blueprints). At a minimum, a tech pack includes:

• Tech sketches
• A BOM
• A graded spec
• Colourway specs
• Artwork specs (if relevant)
• A spot for proto / fit / sales sample comments

BOM (Bill of Materials)

    Part of your tech pack, the BOM is a master list of every physical item required to create your finished product.

UOM (Unit of Measure)

    The type (ie unit) of measurement used for various items or parts of your product.

POM (Point of Measure)

    Specific points on your product that are defined and used for measurement. Most often they’re measured on a flat product (not on the body).

GRADED SPEC

    Included in your tech pack, it’s a chart of POMs (points of measure) for your product in all sizes.

GRADED / GRADING

    The difference in measurements as sizes go up or down.

BLOCK

    A basic pattern that is used as a foundation to develop other styles.

                TERMS

Clothes

    It is a collective term for all items of apparel worn by men, women & children

Costumes

    The term costume can refer to wardrobe or dress of a certain period in history, people or class.

• The costume also refers to the artistic arrangement of accessories in a picture, statue or play, appropriate to the time, place, or other circumstances represented or described to a particular style of clothing worn to portray a type of character at a social event such as a masquerade, a fancy dress party or in an artistic theatrical performance.

Fashion

    It can be termed as a style or a particular look which is a reflection of the social, economical, political & environmental/climatic forces of any given time/period.

    Fashion change in the western world is generally considered to have begun in the middle ages and although is visible in many different kinds of material goods, it is particularly used in apparel.

Style

    Style is any particular characteristic or a look in the apparel or accessories.

    Elements that define a style include line, silhouette & details.

    Style can be interpreted in 3 ways:-

• Designers interpret fashion ideas into new styles as they offer them to the public. The manufacturers assign a style number to each new design which is used to identify it throughout the production, marketing & retailing.

• Designs having the same characters such as a blazer style jacket, an empire line dress. A style may come & go in fashion but a style always remains that style whether it is in fashion or not ex:- polo shirt style will always be in fashion yet it will always have variations every season.

• A person can have a style by wearing fashionable clothes particularly suited to them or a designer may become known for a certain “style” or look

    “To have a style”, meaning to have a certain flair that is specific & individual Manner: how something is done or how it happens; “her dignified manner”; “his rapid manner of talking”; a particular kind (as to appearance); “this style of shoe is in demand”

Fashion trend

    The direction in which styles, colours, fabrics and designs are tending to change. Political events, films, personalities, drams, social and sports events often influence fashion trends

Silhouette

    Contour or outline as shown in a solid black background on white background. Formerly a term widely used to indicate a trend in length & general outline of garment for the coming season.

    Named after a French author and statesmen “Etienine de Silhouette, who made portraits in black with no background

Motifs

    In creative work:

• Motif (narrative), any recurring element in a story that has symbolic significance
• Motif (textile arts), a recurring element or fragment that, when joined together, creates a larger work
• Motif (visual arts), a repeating theme or pattern

 Repeat

    Repeat is the “ Repetition” of floral or geometric print in a fabric design. And Repetition is the use of the same form again and again

Pattern

    The pattern is an underlying structure that organizes surfaces or structures in a consistent, regular manner. The pattern can be described as a repeating unit of shape or form, but it can also be thought of as the “skeleton” that organizes the parts of a composition.

Colour

    Colour is the perceptual characteristic of light described by a colour name. Specifically, colour is light, and light is composed of many colours—those we see are the colours of the visual spectrum: red, orange, yellow, green, blue, and violet. Objects absorb certain wavelengths and reflect others back to the viewer. We perceive these wavelengths as colour.

Shade

    A hue produced by the addition of black.

Tint

    A hue produced by the addition of white.

Hue

    Hue is the term for the pure spectrum colours commonly referred to by the “colour names” – red, orange, yellow, blue, green violet – which appear in the hue circle or rainbow.

Colour Wheel

    A color wheel (also referred to as a colour circle) is a visual representation of colours arranged according to their chromatic relationship. Begin a colour wheel by positioning primary hues equidistant from one another, then create a bridge between primaries using secondary and tertiary colours.

• Primary Colours: Colors at their basic essence; those colours that cannot be created by mixing others

• Secondary Colours: Those colours achieved by a mixture of two primaries

• Tertiary Colours: Those colours achieved by a mixture of primary and secondary hues.

• Complementary Colours: Those colours located opposite each other on the colour wheel.

• Analogous Colours: Those colours located close together on a colour wheel

Value

    Value is defined as the relative lightness or darkness of a colour. It is an essential tool for the designer/artist, in the way that it defines the form and creates spatial illusions. The contrast of value separates objects in space, while gradation of value suggests mass and contour of a contiguous surface.

Textures

    The texture is the quality of an object which we sense through touch. It exists as a literal surface we can feel, but also as a surface we can see, and imagine the sensation might have if we felt it. Texture can also be portrayed in an image, suggested to the eye which can refer to our memories of surfaces we have touched. So a texture can be imaginary.

Balance

    Balance is the concept of visual equilibrium, and relates to our physical sense of balance. It is a reconciliation of opposing forces in a composition that results in visual stability. Most successful compositions achieve balance in one of two ways:

• Symmetrically or Symmetrical balance can be described as having equal “weight” on equal sides of a centrally placed fulcrum. It may also be referred to as formal balance
• Asymmetrical balance, also called informal balance, is more complex and difficult to envisage. It involves the placement of objects in a way that will allow objects of varying visual weight to balance one another around a fulcrum point.

Proportion

    Proportion refers to the relative size and scale of the various elements in a design. The issue is the relationship between objects, or parts, of a whole. This means that it is necessary to discuss proportion in terms of the context or standard used to determine proportions.

Rhythm

    Rhythm can be described as timed movement through space; an easy, connected path along which the eye follows a regular arrangement of motifs. The presence of rhythm creates predictability and order in a composition. Visual rhythm may be best understood by relating it to the rhythm in sound.

    Linear rhythm refers to the characteristic flow of the individual line

Repetition involves the use of patterning to achieve timed movement and a visual “beat”. This repetition may be a clear repetition of elements in a composition, or it may be a more subtle kind of repetition that can be observed in the underlying structure of the image.

Alternation

    Alternation is a specific instance of patterning in which a sequence of repeating motifs are presented in turn; (short/long; fat/thin; round/square; dark/light).

Gradation

    Gradation employs a series of motifs patterned to relate to one another through a regular progression of steps. This may be a gradation of shape or colour. Some shape gradations may, in fact, create a sequence of events, not unlike a series of images in a comic strip.

                TYPES OF FASHION

Classic

    Apparel made in a style that continues to be fashionable over a long period of time, and that may return as high fashion at regular intervals. When revived, classic fashions retain the basic line of the original style but are sometimes altered in minor details

FAD

    Short-lived fashion that becomes suddenly extremely popular, remains for a short period of time and fades quickly. 

Avant Grade (ah-vant gard)

    French term commonly used in English meaning new, unconventional, ahead of its time.Used as an adjective to describe apparel that may be provocative or startling.

Couture (Koo-ture)

    French term for business in which original apparel designs are created by designers & the items are manufactured in the design house using exceptionally fine sewing & tailoring and expensive fabrics.

Haute Couture (oat koo-toor)

    Haute couture (French for “high sewing” or “high dressmaking”) refers to the creation of exclusive custom-fitted clothing. Haute couture is made to order for a specific customer, and it is usually made from high-quality, expensive fabric and sewn with extreme attention to detail and finish, often using time-consuming, hand-executed techniques Firms that create a model that may be sold to private customers or other segments of the fashion industry who also acquire the right to reproduce other designs. Designers show at least 2 collections a year of original designs to the public. An original design is not the only one of its kind, but mean only that the garment was designed and made in the atelier of the designer. As currently used in the United States and in the fashion press, refers to the latest and most advanced fashions; high fashion

            What is the difference between couture and haute couture?

            Couture is the art of dressmaking

            Haute Couture is the fashions created by the art of dressmaking.

Knock-off 

    An item of apparel copied from a more expensive item and generally manufactured from low-priced components so it can sell at a lower price. Compare with LINE-For-LINE COPY and PIRACY. Such as NIRE, SUNBUCKS, ABIDAS etc.

High- Fashion

    Apparel of advanced design available from innovative designer and/or firms. It is usually more expensive & is a trend-setting fashion.

Bridge Fashion

    A line at the upper end of the apparel price range that is made with fewer details and less expensive fabrics than designer clothing

Pret-a-porter (pret-ah–por-tay)

    The French term for ready-to-wear clothes. Many Haute couture designers produce special dress, less expensive pret-a-porter lines of clothing in addition to their custom-made-lines. French, “ready to be carried away”

READY-TO-WEAR (RTW)

    Apparel that is designed, marketed, and sold in standard sizes and is mass-produced.

Describing apparel that does not need any tailoring (example hemming) before it can be worn off-the-rack. In French it is called prêt-à-porter & UK off the rack or “off-the-peg” in casual use)

                STORES

Atelier de couture

    Workrooms in which Parisian haute couture designers and their workmen produce their collections.

Boutiques (boo-teek)

    Small shop selling a variety of merchandise including dresses, jewellery, accessories, antiques, or object d’art.

    Ever since Parisian designer Lucien Lelong opened his boutique de la mansion couture in 1929, haute couture designers have taken up the practice of selling a variety of designer label merchandise in boutiques.

    The term has been applied to small shops everywhere since the 1950s, and now such shops are often contained within large department stores

Speciality Stores or Exclusive Brand outlets (EBO’s)

    A speciality store is a store, usually retail, that offers specific and specialized types of items. These stores focus on selling a particular brand, or a particular type of item. For example, a store that exclusively sells cell phones or video games would be considered specialized.

Multi-brand outlets (MBO’s)

    A store retailing various brands from a single floor.

References: 

Fashion Terminologies. [Online] Tohproblemkyahai.com. Available from: https://tohproblemkyahai.com/fashion-terminologies/ [Accessed 05/06/21].

Fashion Terminology + Abbreviations (FREE PDF download). [Online] Successfulfashiondesigner.com. Available from: https://successfulfashiondesigner.com/ultimate-guide-fashion-design-terminology-abbreviations/ [Accessed 05/06/21].