My project explores coral, reflecting the duality of beauty and decay found in the bleached architectural forms that lie beneath the ocean’s surface.

My interest deepened through primary photographic research and a growing understanding of coral’s vital role within the marine ecosystem. Coral reefs are an endangered environment — as global warming strips them of life through the process of bleaching, it brings with it a silent death to marine life and the gradual loss of oxygen from our air. There is a profound and unsettling beauty in this loss, and it is this tension that sits at the heart of my work.

My practice began with an observation of line and structure: the rigid, skeletal forms of bleached coral, stripped back to their bare architectural essence. From there, I moved into an exploration of contrast — in tone, colour, and texture — between the living and the dead.

I have experimented with a range of lightweight materials, alongside contrasting, heavier fabrics. I have used manipulation techniques to recreate coral’s organic structures. I have combined stitching techniques to produce sculptural textile samples that capture both fragility and the strength of their form.

Working within a neutral palette has been a deliberate choice — one that honours the quiet, ghostly quality of bleached coral and allows the complexity of texture and construction to speak. I have chosen to incorporate black reflecting my early monochromatic drawings to portray the underlying death of coral as a living organism, one that is fragile yet strong.

My final collection is delicate, crystalline and architectural, encapsulating the inherent beauty found within decay.

This body of work is a response to environmental loss — an attempt to hold something precious and disappearing still, and to find, in its skeletal remains, a reason to look more carefully at what we stand to lose.