Einem Innerlichen Augenblick Ausgesetzt
/ Fashion Design
In a 2 months project realized at KISD in partnership with the german stylist Eva Grombach, Transformation in Fashion extracted the personal approach of each designer in the group towards a concept in Fashion Design. For most of us it was the very first experiment in this area, which brought interesting results and new approaches to the idea of what is fashion.
Concept
Eva Grombach became a well-known stylist after creating collections that revised her vision of patriotism, as reported on publications such as Le Monde or Elle Magazine. For this project, Eva brought the people to dig up truthful feelings or ideas they wanted to dress and expose. Fashion is about breaking paradigms, and the first paradigm we had to break was with ourselves.
Approach
Finding something personal to expose is more difficult than it seems. We are often afraid to be judged, or not entirely honest in explaining what are our true reasons. The first phase of the project let aside sketching and drawings to discuss what ideas could be interesting or inspiring or provocative.
I kicked off from a simple old wish: stopping the time. I always wondered how would it feel to be part of a real 'bullet-time' moment where everything around is frozen, and we could walk and analyze things closely before they continued to move. The drawings were based on the exposition of Cornelia Parker, at the TATE Museum, and had no restrictions as to the way clothes would be produced later.
Result
The final dress was presented in a catwalk show in the beginning of 2009 at the KISD. It consisted of a corsette dressed underneath, with folded metal wires built inside. A ripped black dress was used on top. The metal wires kept parts of the dress and other small pieces of textile suspended up to 60 cm around the model.
"Einem Innerlichen Augenblick Ausgesetzt" (An Exposed Interior Snapshot) was the name chosen for this concept. It represented a hurricane of feelings and emotions stopped in time, and exposed around the person in focus. Even if this person moves and walks, everything is constantly hanging to be seen and noticed.
Photos
Mireina Hildebrandt