the making of....aw13 collection 'Summer Darkness'

My thoughts with this collection were based on my visit to the event Summer Darkness in Utrecht. Watching the people walking around in black cloths, dreadlocks and heavy black make-up and at the other hand the lolita's in soft girly dresses made me wondering why. Both seems to say 'don't touch me!'. The darkness frigthens people while the sweet girls seemed so fragile. Someone told me that this way of dressing will protects the wearers their soft and gentle innersoul....

I started to design 'something' with crosses, because I was inspired by the music and meeting the leadsanger of Cruxshadows. A cross is a sign of protection againts all evil. Along the way of the proces I learned from Carmen Bolanos to work with the indigoblue. Blue was used in the old English wars as a 'make-up' to protect the soldiers during the fights.

Choosing wool and handmade felt as my medium for making the garments I wanted to use the raw wool from the 'Zwart Bless' (Black Bless), given by my friend-farmer Marie-Josee. To test the possibilities with the raw wool in combination with the silks I made several samples for colourcombinations and textures. I have made the felt by myself and used the wool in many different ways.

The natural handdyed and printed silks worked perfectly for the airy lolita dresses, but also as a nunofelt for the tops and jackets. My sister helped me with sewing the fabrics under the felted dresses.

In my opinion the closure of the garments had to be more industrial. I found metalic elements which are normally used for electricity stuff. Together with rubber strips and rings they formed a good closure on the dark clothes.

In a next post I hope to show you more of the finished garments.

Strongfelt, Lisa Klakulak

Lisa arrived very early at the morning of 19th June 2013. She had some troubles to get the right flights because of some stormy weather in her area. Her suitcases were on another plane and we had to wait for a couple of hours. This gave us the chance to chitchat in the juicebar at Schiphol. It is always a surprise to meet someone who is only known by the internet. In this case a very pleasant surprise. The first thing I learned was to pronounce her name well; the accent is on the KU in her familyname! Lisa is a lovely, talkative person and my family and I had a good click with her.

Lisa was happy with the workshop-space and prepaired the needs for the participants for the 2 workshops with partial felts in 3D and nunofelt creations. She works very structured and her approach to the proces or feltmaking is very unique. Her Strongfelt analises make a lot of sense to the students.

The group of students in both classes came from many countries, like Gemany, England, Tsjechie, Belgium, Israel, Denmark, Austria and ofcourse some from the Netherlands too. They learned a lot for sure. Bringing the big world to my humble atelier makes it all worthwhile.  

In the next few days I shall post little by little about each other event that took place at my atelier and I shall talk about my own collection 'Summer Darkness' this year.

'GATHERING'

A special Gathering with 4 international designers giving a spectactular fashionshow on the 11th July 2013 at the OBA in Amsterdam, just before the official fashionweek in Amsterdam will start. There will be a preview at 19.00 hrs with a small talk about the works. At 20.00-21.00 hrs their will be the show in the theatre. Buy your tickets online at www.OBA.nl to be sure of a seat.

The designers are SheverDuska aka Tatiana Sheverda, Asia Prusinowska, Dorie van Dijk and Horst van Horst Couture. The connecting factor is wool and felt! They will tell you about their passion and motivation for their new collection 2013. And I can tell you that each of us has made such a different collection!!!

Asia Prusinowska (Poland, living in the UK) - Memoir
Tatiana Sheverda (Russia, living in Australia) - Galactic Garden
Dorie van Dijk (the Netherlands) - Summer Darkness
Horst (USA) - New Origins

Except for the works of the designers there also will be shown the stunning works made by 4 upcoming designers in the classes Horst has been teaching the past week.
The works will be shown by some lovely models at the music of Cruxshadows.

See you, hope you all will be part of the GATHERING!!!!!!!!!!