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Promoting a healthy lifestyle for children through textiles design.

Summer Hope
Oct 29, 2018
3 min read

My general idea for this project is about promoting a healthy diet and to influence children into wanting to try new fruits and vegetables they haven't tried before. Using, colour, pattern, repeat and drawing I am going to produce designs that can be featured within a school or within a child's room, e.g. curtains, duvets, lampshades, all interior products featuring this design to help promote the idea of healthy eating. Starting a healthy diet at a young age will help improve the child's health as it grows and develops, helping to fight diseases and illnesses and keep a healthy lifestyle.

As part of developing my idea, I am going to use the idea of the 'gut flora' (flower) to merge this with the idea of eating and also to introduce edible flowers, linking to this idea of feeding a 'flower', making it more exciting and interesting for children, however, not twisting the truth as you can technically eat these 'edible flowers' and feed you gut flora.

Looking at edible flowers, there are so many that I didn't know were edible, this is interesting for me and also for my audience. "Edible flowers add colour, flavour and texture to savoury and sweet dishes, as well as cordials, oils and butters. A wide range of annuals and perennial edible flowers can be grown in the garden from early spring to late autumn. Children can be encouraged to take an active interest in growing and preparing food through edible flowers." Edible flowers can make a difference to the taste of a food or meal, making it more exciting and tasty, the fact that you can eat specific flowers will be interesting and exciting for children as this is something different and new for them. It states in the quote, growing these flowers can be a fun activity for children as well as eating them, this gives a different perspective of promoting a healthy lifestyle as you're showing the children how they actually grow and form which can influence them to want to eat and try them more.

Here's a list of a few edible flowers from 'your garden':

Alpine Pinks- Ideal for adding to cakes as flavoured sugars, oils and vinegars.

Bergamont- strong spicy scent, makes tea and compliments rice, pasta and bacon.

Daisy- Petals can make an interesting garnish for cakes and salads.

Day Lily- Add buds and petals of this flower to stir fry, salads and soups.

Elderflower- used to make wine and cordials.

Hibiscus- refreshing citrus flavoured tea enhanced by rosemary.

Lavender- flavoured sugar, honey or vinegar, can be used in cakes or biscuits, while sprigs compliment roast pork, lamb and chicken.

Nasturtium- brightly coloured, peppery flowers are good in salads and pasta dishes.

Primrose- decorate cakes with crystallised or fresh primrose or cowslip flowers. They can be frozen in ice cubes.

Rose- all roses are edible with the more fragrant roses being the best. Petals can be crystallised, used to flavour drinks, sugar and even icing for summer cakes.