Frances Geesin

Dr. Frances Geesin is Reader in Textiles & Materials at The London College of Fashion, University of the Arts, London. She is a researcher / textile artist and an Honorary Fellow of the Institute of Nanotechnology (Hon FIoN) and a member of the Materials UK Education and Skills DTI Working Group. In 2003 she was awarded The Arts Foundation Fellowship for Textile Design. She trained in painting and woven textiles, worked as a designer and colourist in industry and made numerous knitted costumes for TV, dance and film. She gained her Doctorate at the Royal College of Art in 1995. Her research into conductive fibres and materials were incorporated in a collaborative project with the ‘Design for Life' team at Brunel University facilitating a ‘Talking Waistcoat' for the disabled. This was followed by a three-year consultancy with Philips Research where her discoveries laid the foundations for their work with wearable electronics. The electroplating of textiles has become her signature and with her partner Ron Geesin they made three interactive body responsive sound and light textile panels for The Challenge of Materials Gallery at the Science Museum. She applies her knowledge of materials and processes as an expressive medium through which she articulates ideas, concerns and aesthetics and collaborates with others when appropriate. She has exhibited and lectured in the UK, Europe and Japan: the exhibitions 'Revelation - Textile artists addressing issues' and 'Through The Surface' both toured the UK concluding at the National Museum of Modern Art, Kyoto; ‘Artists at Work - New Technology in Textile and Fibre Art', Prato, Italy; ‘Fashion In Motion', with Simon Fraser at the V&A; 'Slipstitch', Dutch Textile Museum, Tilburg; ‘Meet the British Crafts', Ozone Gallery, Tokyo; ‘Ever & Again', Chelsea College of Art, London.

The emphasis of her research is in aesthetics and the communication of ideas. She explores industrial shielding fabrics and fibres and manipulates and electroplates thermoplastic materials. Geesin enjoys the support of the non-woven company COLBOND and Web Dynamics and has used their fabrics to collaborate with fellow practitioners, most notably Scilla Speet, course leader at Central Saint Martins. Their work resulted in a Gold Award for Technical Innovation from The Goldsmiths Craft and Design Council for two consecutive years. She is currently working with scientists exploring Nanotechnology and interpreting their electron microscopic images, contributing through her practice to demystifying nano science. This work has been shown at: The EuroNanoForum, Edinburgh; Nanotechnologies & Smart Textiles for Industry & Fashion at The Royal Society, London and; ‘Inspired by Nano', at The Grapevine Contemporary Gallery, Norwich. Her work has also been featured in ‘Nano Art' on line competitions.

Geesin is currently interpreting nano images for communication to be shown at galleries and alternative venues. She has developed a project called 'Fabrics of the Social Mind' with a Cognitive Neural Scientist at Manchester University and is exploring transferable technology with a Scottish University imbedding nano inks as UV indicators in fabrics and jewellery. She continues to research alternative applications for shielding fabrics and is a member of the collaborative practice-based research project 'Worn Again: Rethinking Recycled Textiles' which is based at Chelsea College of Arts and a collaborative project Considerate Design for Personalised Fashion products at LCF.