Neil Bottle designs printed textiles for fashion and interiors from his studio in Margate on the Kent coast. Neil’s work explores cutting edge technology combined with craft techniques creating one-off and limited edition printed textiles. His work focuses on the creative interaction between traditional textile design and new digital technologies.
His research explores the relationship between craft and technology and how these seemingly opposite methodologies can work together to create innovation in textile design and production.
In this respect, Bottle explores the application of computer-aided design from a craft perspective but with the added flexibility that digital printing offers, such as the ability to alter scale, colour, order of layers, intensity and layout more efficiently. The result is a unique digital one-off object, which can be flat or designed around 3D forms, encompassing traditional crafted textiles techniques.
Consultancy projects include designing exclusive ranges of accessories for the Victoria & Albert Museum, the British Museum, the Shakespeare’s Globe Theatre and the Royal Academy of Art in London as well as the Guggenheim Museum New York and the Philadelphia Museum of Art Pennsylvania in the USA. Work is exhibited internationally and collections have been designed for stores such as Liberty, Harrods, Browns, Fortnum & Mason, Neiman Marcus, Holt Renfrew and Bergdorf Goodman.
His work is exhibited internationally, and he combines research and design with his post as Programme Director for the BA Hons degree in Fashion Textiles: Print, MA Printed Textiles for Fashion & Interiors and MA Digital Fashion at University for the Creative Arts in Rochester.
