Fashion design can be described as perpetually having to produce new suggestions of dress. The foundational tool for realising such propositions in a precise and focused way is the act of seeing. Rather than referring to the sense of sight or visual perception, the act of seeing builds on the concept of the ‘inner eye’ in the sense of imagination, discovery, and the direction of design ideas.

Seeing as a foundational act in the creative process is not a novel concept; on the contrary, it is usually an intuitive act that any designer performs when directing design ideas towards aesthetic goals. However, systematisation and an awareness of seeing in design processes, as methods of developing ways of working in the field of fashion design, are still open for further research. Therefore, the research presented in this thesis is aimed to systematically explore the act of seeing as a methodological tool in fashion design processes.

The experiments described in this thesis were used to explore the act of seeing in relation to concepts such as ideation, decision-making, direction, and reflection. The acts of seeing were documented iteratively in photographic sequences, and were important materials for documentation and reflection. The interaction between seeing and doing was recorded using action/reaction chains, and analysed through two modes of seeing: forming and materialising.

The most important contributions of this research are: 1) The hypothesis that the act of seeing is a methodological tool that is fundamental to creative processes. 2) A framework of ideas that builds on the interplay between the act of seeing and consequential act of doing, which was the basis for experiments that shifted between the two modes forming and materialising. 3) A mapping of different kinds of seeing.

This raises awareness of design sensibilities, and could lead to more conscious and focused ways of working in which the act of seeing is a foundation for ways of designing that are both methodological and systematic.