Costume. Russian Hammer and Sickle logo stenciled onto a red t-shirt. Dance Show 2014.

For the Dance Show I was asked to stencil the Russian Hammer and Sickle logo onto several red T-Shirts. It was decided to not include the Star that is part of the logo.

(The finished T-Shirts hanging to dry)

 

First I researched the logo online and chose a very simple design with clean lines, nothing fancy or fiddly. I drew the hammer and the sickle seperately onto 2 pieces of paper, which I then had to adjust as it was felt that my original designs were just a little to large. Once re-drawn I then placed clear acetate over the drawings and traced them onto the acetate using a black permanent marker pen. 

(Above pictures show the internet designs and the pencil drawings of the Hammer and Sickle)

 

Next I cut the shapes out of the acetate using a stanley knife, after placing the acetate onto a cutting board. I used a metal ruler when cutting the straight lines. These acetates were then used as stencils.

(Cutting the shapes out of the acetates)

 

It was originally decided that the stencils would be sprayed on but after trying this out on the first T-Shirt it was decided to use paint instead, which was to be sponged on. I thought it may be possible to spray the stencil without adding anything around the stencil but that was not to be and I did add sheets of paper all around the stencil, stuck on with masking tape. Even with this it proved difficult to spray the T-Shirt without it bleeding to beneath the stencil. Also the spray kept coming out lumpy and bitty even though I had shook it several times. Plus it needed to be sprayed several times, building up the colour, for it to look anywhere remotely bright yellow as the colour just kept soaking into the fabric.

Using the paint was so much more easier and quicker and neater. I used a sponge to apply the colour. I stenciled all the Sickle's on first and allowed them to dry and then I stenciled all the Hammer's on next.

(Pictures showing the original Hammer stencil after using the spray and the tub of yellow emulsion paint that was finally used)

 

The T-Shirts had to have the logo stenciled into the middle of the shirt. I placed a thick piece of cardboard inside the T-Shirt to stop the paint from soaking through to the back of the shirt and even though I felt I had folded the top of the shirt and the sides over all roughly in the same place as each other, after I had finished the task discovered that somehow not all the logo's were central and some were down lower than others. Oopps!! I was told that they were fine and wouldn't matter. Next time I feel I should work on my own without the distraction of other crew members chatting to me whilst I worked lol.