Mary Katrantzou's Wild 2014 F/W Collection Is A Big Departure for The Greek Designer.

When I first introduced you to fashion designer Mary Katrantzou in 2008 - 2009, she had barely broken into the fashion world. At that time her clothes had printed textiles which emulated chunky jewelry and perfume bottles and were accompanied by jewelry of her own design:


In 2011 I showed you that Mary's work had progressed to combine her digitally printed textiles with lots of embellishments and structured shapes inspired by home decor. Again, her own chunky jewelry was incorporated in to the collection:


As time passed, Mary simplified her designs in terms of silhouettes and materials, but mainly stayed with the photographic textiles as recently as her 2014 Spring/ Summer Collection. You will notice her jewelry designs seem to have disappeared from her work:


Mary is currently best known for her bright figure hugging dresses with digitally printed landscapes, like those shown below:


Now, considered one of the top designers in fashion, her work has continued to evolve.

Mary Katrantzou Fall/Winter 2014 Collection:



In a big change from her usual digitally printed textiles, the 2014 Fall/Winter collection from Mary Katrantzou is a very tactile, highly embellished and unique collection. The silhouettes are a big departure from her previous collections, fabrics are varied and mixed (even patches are woven together to create a textile) and the imagery shifts from photographic and cheerful to a darker, more serious, three dimensional style. Pleats, asymmetry, applique patches and metal hardware embellishes the collection.



Here's a look at a few of the more unusual pieces from the collection which debuted this week in London:













Mary Katrantzou

Modern Caskets For Your Body And Soul. The 2014 Equinox Collection from Camaquen.

I'm not a morbid person, despite having written about modern casket options before. No one really likes to talk about preparing for death, yet it's a realistic inevitability. That said, casket shopping is not unlike any other furniture purchase. You want one that is comfortable, reflects your design and philosophical sensibilities and is well-made without having to, well... sell your soul.

Temporary Monograms: IMPRINT Letter-Pressed Textiles.

IMPRINT is a collaborative concept by Sebastian Herkner and Zur Schwäbischen Jungfrau. As part of Passionswege 2013 during Vienna Design Week, German designer Sebastian Herkner found a more contemporary method of individualizing textiles and presented it in an installation: instead of needle and cotton, steam is used to stamp the initials on the fabric – which keep until the next wash.










project assistants: Robin Benito Schmid & Martin Hirth

photo at top of the post by Sam Dunne, courtesy of Core77.
all other images courtesy of Sebastian Herkner

Ian Berry Does It In Denim. Check Out The Fashionable Art of Denimu.

above: Ian Berry AKA Denimu, A Blue Eye (Avalon Pub), denim on denim, 122x61cm (48.03x24.02inches)

UK artist Ian Berry works in a medium usually reserved for fashion - denim. he constructs scenes and figures by cutting and piecing together that well-worn closet staple, jeans. As a result of this, he goes by the name Denimu and has attracted quite a following worldwide.


above: portrait of Lapo Elkann

above: Journey Home

above: Mike and Ike

Using various shades of denim, he cuts and stitches the pieces together to create urban scenes and detailed portraits.




above: Flocking to the Portobello Market (in progress)

Newsstand Installation in New York
His newsstand installation that appeared in New York was phenomenal. Consisting of numerous magazine covers, candy bars and even a vending machine, Denimu pieced together each and every element of the life-sized work:



details:





And here's a look at some of the individual magazine covers created for the above piece:




More pieces of his work.
London Punk:


Before It Went Down:


The Brooklyn Diner:


The Other Side Of The Track:


Artist Biography (courtesy of cattogallery.co.uk):

IAN BERRY Aka DENIMU

We all love denim, don't we? It's the great democratic fabric, worn by everyone from the farmer to the aristocrat, the manual worker to the oligarch.

But for the British artist Ian Berry, it is so much more. It's probably fair to say, Ian is obsessed. This is the guy who changed his stage name to Denimu and made a career out of turning jeans into works of art.

Ian conjures remarkably detailed portraits and urban landscapes using nothing more than discarded jeans. Over many weeks he cuts, stitches and glues using only the varying shades of the fabric to provide contrast and shadow. The effect is extraordinary.

Ian's denim epiphany came during a trip back to his childhood home in Huddersfield. During a big clear-out session, Ian found himself staring at a big pile of unwanted jeans destined for the charity shop. Affectionate memories came flooding back, along with a wave of tactile enthusiasm for the fabric. At that point, he knew he'd found the key to his artistic career.

Born 1984 in Huddersfield, UK, Ian began his artistic experiments with denim while working as an art director in London and Sydney. Despite building a successful career and creating campaigns for brands such as Nissan, Guinness and Talisker Whiskey, the call of the rivets and seams was too deafening to ignore.

Eventually, the public caught on and Ian enjoyed enough commercial success to devote himself full time to his art. He had two near sell-out shows in Sweden, his new adopted home, and also showed in the US and Portugal. His work has since sold across Europe, America, the Middle East and Australasia to private, public and corporate collections, and has been featured in innumerable art and fashion magazines from Elle to Playboy and interviewed on Swedish and Portuguese TV.

Naturally, Ian's enthusiasm for denim goes beyond exploring its artistic potential. He's also become something of a historian of the textile. So you can imagine how delighted he worked with the town of Fairmount, Indiana last year. Fairmount is the home town of James Dean, who arguably launched denim as a fashion item when he wore those Lee Riders in Rebel Without A Cause. So when the James Dean Gallery wanted a mural, they came to Ian. He based his work on the iconic Roy Schatt photograph to create what has become possibly the first denim 'street art' project in the world.

Denimu

A shout out to the fabulous Ellen November for bringing this unusual work to my attention.