As a blogger and fashion student (turned recent graduate), Fashion Weeks are an essential date in my calendar due to the surge of new trends to be on the lookout for in the coming season, the streetstyle inspiration from industry’s most coveted, and one important one (especially for when I attend London Fashion Week): discovering up and coming designers.
I’m passionate about fashion, sure, but being in the industry as a blogger is a lot more to me than that; it’s about understanding what’s in and what’s out, having the ability to identify trends and inspire others on how to incorporate what we see on the runway into our daily wardrobes, and also being on the inside helping to encourage new talent. That is what I love about fashion and this industry, and London has ever growing support for new designers with incredible talent to make it big!
Yesterday, June 7th, the world-renewed Italian fashion school Istituto Marangoni (London campus) had its 2017 Graduate Fashion Week, showcasing their students’ work on the runway. I had the chance to interview some of the designers, which gave me such inspiration and applaud for their hard work and enthusiasm about fashion! Of course, I wanted to share it all with you, so here are five incredible designers, their stories and their collections, I hope you enjoy discovering them as did I!
Xx Bianca
Tienamayra Oetojo
Q. As a student at the world-renowned fashion school Istituto Marangoni, what prompted you to study design in London?
T: I wanted to study design in one of the fashion capitals because that’s where most of the important people in fashion are and I thought it’ll be a great opportunity to study and live in a place where I can meet people and start building my connection. Milan and Paris were not an option because I can’t speak French or Italian. Then I did some research on the best fashion schools in the world, came across Istituto Marangoni, saw that they have a campus in London and I applied. I’ve been to London before and loved the city, so when they accepted me, there was no second thought.
Q. What were your inspirations behind your collection for the Graduate Fashion Week?
T: I started with myself, my roots as an Indonesian born Chinese. We live in a inter-cultural world where the lines between races, cultures and genders are blurred. Being in tune with the ROOTLESS identities of today’s modern society filled with the phenomenon known as Third Culture Kids and others alike, this collection explores the idea of freedom in movement and flexibility to adapt. The main focus is on the silhouettes, which take their inspirations from a series of photographs of dancers in movement captured by Japanese photographer, Shinichi Maruyama. Frozen in time, the movements translate into sculpture-like photos; thus the sculptural silhouettes of the collection. Raw edges and hanging threads symbolize the bits and pieces of cultures absorbed by people who are exposed to other cultures but only partially. Layers of different fabrics are bonded together creating a whole new unique fabric. In the same way that influences of different cultures are embodied by people who don’t truly belong to only one culture, making each and every one a completely unique individual who are not rooted or constricted to just one place and culture.
Q. How can we identify your brand from the crowd, and what do you feel makes it unique?
T: My brand explores one of a kind silhouettes and textile manipulations with clean lines. It’s avant-garde but still wearable. It’s feminine and fun. It’s minimalistic and contemporary. Expect great attention to details such as top stitching. I used two organic cotton fabrics for my SS18 collection and I’m working towards making my brand sustainable.
Q. What is your favorite look from your line and why?
T: The last look from the show, with the wide pink trousers and white, round top with hanging threads on it. That top was actually the first piece of clothing that I designed for this collection. I love it because you won’t find it anywhere else. It’s pretty and feminine, but then it's paired with this fun, wide trousers, and you get a look that is modern and edgy.
Q. Who is your target customer? What does she like and what does she do?
T: Strong women who believe in themselves because I have strong silhouettes in my collection and to pull it off, a woman has to be confident and believe that she can. My pieces would be on the higher end of the price point. I expect celebrities, socialites, bloggers, and fashion people to be my customers because they always attend events that allow them to wear the more unique pieces from my brand. I also have less crazy pieces, don’t worry, which can be worn on the daily basis.
Q. Finally, what can we expect to see from you in the future?
T: I would like to use more sustainable and degradable fabrics, and I expect in the future, as I expand my connections, that I would be able to grow my brand into a fully sustainable brand. My goal is to make clothes that are wearable, so although the six looks that I showed at my Graduate Fashion Show were the ones with bigger, crazier silhouettes, they are still comfortable to wear. You can expect more of this and more everyday type of clothes, which would still be unique one way or another, in the future.
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Noa Moses
Q. As a student at the world-renowned fashion school Istituto Marangoni, what prompted you to study design in London?
N: I fell in love with the city when visiting several times with my family . Design plays a big role in this city and so this gives me loads of inspiration. I like the diversity of cultures, the large amount of art galleries and the range of fashion exhibitions that are available to us here in London.
Q. What were your inspirations behind your collection for the Graduate Fashion Week?
N: My inspiration for my final collection is the female body form and the beauty of its shapes. I also took inspiration from Alexander Calder’s wire work for my style of drawing lines. These drawings look like a wire that has been curved and twisted according to a woman’s silhouette.
Q. How can we identify your brand from the crowd, and what do you feel makes it unique?
N: I think that what makes my brand unique is that I combine handmade drawing into the garments’ structures. This is not drawing on top of a garment but incorporating the illustrations with the features, cuts and curves of the individual piece.
Q. What is your favorite look from your line and why?
N: My favourite look is the white A-line dress with pleated fabric underneath. I draped that dress and it’s all one pattern with no side seam and only a centre back seam. Both the simplicity of the pattern and at the same time how well it sits on the body is what makes it a good piece. I like the use of embellishment along the drawing and it’s also the first one I did for that collection!
Q. Who is your target customer? What does she like and what does she do?
N: My target is a young woman, with a lust for life. She is intellectually strong and she is mainly interested in art and design. Chic and elegant, she isn’t afraid to spend, which is reflected in the quality of her clothing and in the places that she spends her time. You may find her in her leisure time in an art gallery, sipping an ice latte in the sun of Exhibition Road or holidaying in St Tropez.
Q. Finally, what can we expect to see from you in the future?
N: To create more and more. To push my creativity in many directions. There will be Art!
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Anna Zimmerman
Q. As a student at the world-renowned fashion school Istituto Marangoni, what prompted you to study design in London?
A: Even though I’m German my family is quite deeply connected to Italy, Istituto Marangoni felt like the right choice. I’ve lived 2 years in Cambridge prior my course in London were I fell in love with the UK. I also felt like the endless possibilities of london as a city with its museums, cultures and networking opportunities to be the prefect location for an emerging designer.
Q. What were your inspirations behind your collection for the Graduate Fashion Week?
A: My inspiration for this graduate collection was the Bauhaus era and the way they combined all sorts of art like sculpture, photography and painting into one “art house” which led me to combining different textured fabrics and trims. Aesthetically, Lazlo Moholy-Nagy a Hungarian Bauhaus artist’s half circle compositions were my main feature within the garments.
Q. How can we identify your brand from the crowd, and what do you feel makes it unique?
A: My brand is a quite distinctive when it comes to combing different fabrics and textures with a sophisticated silhouette. Statement colours are combined and create a statement piece everytime. I like my customers to be able to dress them down with a pair of sneakers as well as high heels to go out.
Q. What is your favorite look from your line and why?
A: My favourite look is a combo of a long statement coat with half circle details on the back with long trousers and a long shift top, as they can be all worn individually but together create a power look.
Q. Who is your target customer? What does she like and what does she do?
A: My target customer is a woman who lives in a urban location, needing garments for work as well as events she goes to. She enjoys going to art galleries, appreciates architecture and design in general. To her high Quality and wearability in combination with statement features are important.
Q. Finally, what can we expect to see from you in the future?
A: Well, I am just getting started so there is definitely more to come, staying true to my aesthetics and appreciation of high quality garments.
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Ece Sahin
Q. As a student at the world-renowned fashion school Istituto Marangoni, what prompted you to study design in London?
E: I chose to study design in London due the cultural diversity, the abundance of research sources and of course the freedom of expression.
Q. What were your inspirations behind your collection for the Graduate Fashion Week?
E: My graduate collection has been inspired by Prosopagnosia. People who have this condition have regular cognitive paterns exept they can not isentify faces including their own. I explored how clothes and its elements such as shape, colour etc. may function as a compensatory strategy in order to support their recognition process.
Q. How can we identify your brand from the crowd, and what do you feel makes it unique?
E: My design are unique from the crowd because I look for inspiration from topics such as neuropshychology. My designs are not just based on aesthetic but perhaps may play a part of solving a bigger issue. My work is always very conceptual.
Q. What is your favorite look from your line and why?
E: My favourite look my line up would have to be my first look, if I had to choose just one look to describe my collection it would be first look. It is the epitome on my concept.
Q. Who is your target customer? What does she like and what does she do?
E: My target customers would be someone who is looking for their clothes to support them day to day. Whether it is prosopagnosia or another condition. My customer will be open minded and aware to the issues if the world around them.
Q. Finally, what can we expect to see from you in the future?
E: In future I plan to further educate myself in order to prepare myself before making my print in the fashion world.Most importantly, I will continue to design as I am doing now, with meaning behind my design maybe we can fight some of the issues people face day to day.
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Alessandra Tacla
Q. As a student at the world-renowned fashion school Istituto Marangoni, what prompted you to study design in London?
A: London is a very welcoming city, you constantly meet diffrent people from all around the world and it’s very easy to feel a part of it. I decided to study in London because there are so many opportunities for open-minded creatives.
Q. What were your inspirations behind your collection for the Graduate Fashion Week?
A: My collection is about childhood memories, seen through two different perspectives: an untangible one, represented by childhood’s fantasies and fears, still alive through our subconscious, and a tangible side, interpreted by toys and games. I was looking at educational toys, such as puzzles, mounting bricks and articulated toys that are put together by joints or intersections.
Q. How can we identify your brand from the crowd, and what do you feel makes it unique?
A: My brand treats garments as if they were toys, always joining each detail to form a whole that is quirky, bold, fun and colourful. My brand’s main idea is to incorporate to fashion the way how children can always find solutions to play with everyday objects, and how each person has their inner children living inside them and wanting to come out.
Q. What is your favorite look from your line and why?
A: My favourite look from my line up is the first one! The oversized orange vinyl jacket has details of intersections in the sleeves, and the pink dress was made all by hand, with metal eyelets and PVC tapes uniting each piece to form a cocktail dress fully made of puzzles.
Q. Who is your target customer? What does she like and what does she do?
A: My target customer is 17 to 40 years old. She is a sophisticated girl, looking to have fun in life and in her way of dressing. For her, everyday is a new opportunity to think and act out of the box. She wants to express her personality and quirkiness to the world!
Q. Finally, what can we expect to see from you in the future?
A: I am looking forward to finding exciting jobs and working on personal projects in the near future. I’m excited to see my name on promising scenarios very soon!
Thank you to Istituto Marangoni London, Trace Publicity and all the graduating designers for the interview!
Photo credit: IM
OMG!!! Loved all the pieces, their construction are impecable, what a cool experience ♥
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These interviews were so insightful, definitely going to keep a lookout for what they design next! <3
XO, Jessi
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