This week I was lucky enough to attend a college trip up to London having a private tour of Alexander Mcqueen's collection 'Roses', which was inspired by Mcqueen's love of flowers. There is very much this sense of fragility to the collection in that Mcqueen was interested in the temporary nature of flowers - that nothing is permenant and beauty dies.
We learned that this garment, when it walked the runway, was actually all made out of real, authentic flowers that elegantly fell to the ground as the model walked. It was constructed and made just two hours before it hit the runway!! It's been great to see and learn more about the artistic possibilies within fashion - the designer was able to create a garment from real-life
roses and flowers that speak pure beauty and elegance.
It was really exciting to learn about how the designer worked to produce the actual shape of 'roses' within the garments - a large amount of draping fabric would be twisted and swirled into this beautiful rose-like shape. I found that the creative freedom that went into these garments is really brilliant and inspiring to me - I love to see the designers visions coming into a reality that can really speak words and inspire viewers.
This was one of my absolute favourite garments of the collection - I love the way that they corset comes asymetrically across the front of body, creating and interesting silhouette and how the flowers embroidery flows across the different fabrics and textures, as the freedom of plants in nature.
What was really interesting to see was the connections between Lee's style and Sarah Burton's (new creative director) style. - Sarah was inkeeping with Mcqueen's ideas/creations, whilsts at the same time bringing in something new and refreshing that works within contemporary fashion.
Another thing that I really loved seeing was these sort of mood boards and production boards that included various samples of techniques, images, drawings, etc. It was greatly inspiring to me to be able to see this overal visual appoach to the entire production process of the garments - the links were all really clear and thoroughly thought out which is a massive thing to look at and take inspiration from for my own work - being able to articulate an idea and carry it through to a final piece clearly with all the links and relevance there.
I overall really enjoyed the exhibition and have so much to learn from and take inspiration from in my own work and ideas! It was a really great expreience and has helped to enhance my knowledge on fashion production and this idea of creating a collection with clear links and inspirations.
- Louise x
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