Lyle & Scott "Wool School" Jumper

British knitwear brand Lyle & Scott recently worked alongside Central Saint Martins College of Art & Design on the on-going "Wool School" project, with Campaign for Wool. Students from the uni were asked to create designs which represented Lyle & Scott's rich history and identity in knitwear, under the theme of, "traditions of the British Isles"

The winning design was created by Kate Annis, and was put into production shortly after. Her design stood out to the judges with her innovative use of both traditional Scottish tartan and argyle, and choice of bold, vibrant colours; something which Lyle & Scott is very passionate about. The jumper has been produced in Hawick, Scotland and is made from 100% lambswool. The brand is known for their Classic Golf Jumpers but Annis' contemporary design brings a certain sense of playfulness to this traditional piece of clothing.

The Lyle & Scott "Wool School Winner" jumper is available here.

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Albam x The Campaign for Wool

A few months ago Albam teamed up with Nottingham Trent University to take part in the The Campaign for Wool competition. Students were given the brief to design a piece of knitwear for Albam's AW13 collection, with the winning design making it into production.

The winning design, which Albam selected themselves was by 1st year Knitwear Design student Jessie Roselyn and has been made in two colour options. The design itself is made from 100% Lambswool, features both Honeycomb and Fisherman's Diamond stitch, ribbed hems and is finished off with a Corozo button placket. As with many of Albam's garments this design has been Made in England, just up the road from their studio in Notts.

A massive well done to Jessie Roselyn, she must be very proud to see her designs in such a prestigious brand. Very cool indeed.

The Campaign for Wool School Sweater is available here.

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CHOMP by Mirim Seo + Weekend Links

Lovely wooden puzzle book series, CHOMP by Mirim Seo. Designed to teach children about food chains across several environments. Read more about the project here.

This week has left me exhausted. My part-time job called and I was roped in to work full time hours, covering holidays and conferences so blogging duties were left till evenings. Early starts and late nights continuously does take its toll, we all know that, but to know that I'd be blogging/editing again by 7pm kept me going throughout the days.

Buckets & Spades also made it past the 800th post mark, can you believe that? I'll be working all weekend but in the evenings I'll be on GTA 5, enjoy yours folks. Plans?

Weekend Bucket List

The colourful history of London's most hardworking logo.
Marks & Spencer launch Best of British collection.
Incredible GTA 5 Time-Lapse video.
The importance of good photography on your blog and some tips.
Five O'Clock magazine by Harry's.
10 words we don't use anymore, but really should!
A typical Florida afternoon.
American's coming to England, Pop-Up Flea in London this weekend.

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Avendano's Deli by Jessica Giboin

Re-branding project for a San Francisco based butchers, Avedano's Deli by design graduate Jessica Giboin. One of the best identity projects I've seen in a while and it's sure making me want to visit.

For more information on the project visit here.

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Build The I'mpossible by Jessica Alley

Really lovely student packaging design project by Jessica Alley, based on building and promoting awareness for sustainable education in Guatemala, Nicaragua and Laos. The "Pencils of Promise" were apart of a full campaign (click here to view), which was under the title Build The I'mpossible. A strong message communicated in a really simple and clever way.

What's everyone got planned for this weekend? I'm thinking bike rides, bbqs and plenty of good strong beer. You with me?

In other exciting news - Buckets & Spades is currently Number 1 on Bloglovin's Up and Coming Men's Fashion blogs, very pleased with that. If you're not already you can follow my blog here.

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Beans For Victory

(Image source)

I get a real buzz when I come across student projects like this one by Joao Brandao. The brief was to create a range of commemorative packaging for a commercial product. Beans for Victory was inspired by the Second World War, times of rationing and the role Heinz played in distributing food to those in need.

Really love this concept. (First blog post mentioning baked beans....)

Matija Blagojevic's Milky Packaging

I think this is the second time I've featured milk based packaging in the last 6 months (see Anders Drage's Mountain Milk) but to heck with it, I love the stuff after all. Milky is a project by Matija Blagojevic which he worked on for his MA degree in Graphic Design. This is just a portion of the project which also features some really nifty cereal boxes, the designs work perfectly together. I'm not 100% sure who the target audience is but I'm pretty sure they would catch your eye in the isle, next to all the everyday plastic cartons. I'm sold.

You can see the whole of Blagojevic's Milky project here

In other news - Thank you for all your positive and uplifting comments last week, from when I was being a right grump-bags and down in the dumps. I think I needed that to snap me out of it, I may not be in a great place in terms of a career but there's a lot of people with much bigger problems to deal with. Also you might have noticed that Buckets and Spades is now Dot Com! You don't need to update any of your GFC, links or bookmarks; everything should work just the same. If you do notice you're having troubles  or my posts not showing up in your reader please do let me know.

Enjoy your weekend folks.

Simon Laliberte's Poilu

After a bit of a dull week it's always nice to end it a high. I came across this packaging project by Canadian Simon Laliberte a couple of weeks and my first thought was "Ha BRILLIANT!", I knew I had to share it. This sort of packaging design really does brighten my days up, it's this kind of humorous thinking that inspires me and makes me want to get creating something of my own.

Laliberte has cleverly thought of a way of making somewhere which is usually pretty plain and turned it into something humorous and endearing. Humor does it everything for me. I know little about the designer other than the concept above were created for a uni project. Pretty cool ay?

Check out more of Simon Lailberte's work here.

Me and Hollie are off to Brighton for a few days next week (Mon to Thurs, maybe spending the last day in London) so no posts for a wee while. The Berlin trip fell through due to lack of funds, so we're holidaying on familiar soil. If you have any recomendations please leave a comment or tweet me @mat_buckets