Working as a theatre designer is not – technically speaking – a fashion related job, yet it’s a tremendously creative career, something that gives you an incredible knowledge about fabrics and tailoring techniques and the chance to have your say over all visual fields, from sets to scenery and costumes. The best thing about such a career is that it allows you to access warehouses with floors and floors of costumes spanning from all ages. I like books about fashion, but one of my passions is finding obscure volumes about costume design for the theatre. I love reading about theatre costume designers, about their careers, costumes and tailoring secrets. One of my favourite books is for example Quaderno di costumi teatrali by theatre costume designer Giovanna Buzzi. This slim volume is actually a sort of sketchbook featuring a selection of costumes by Buzzi and a few notes about some of the most famous opera and theatre shows she worked on.
Often, when I look at particular creations by fashion or accessory designers, I make connections in my mind between the world of fashion and what I have read about theatre costume design. This always happens when I see stuff by Christophe Coppens. The Belgian designer actually studied as a theatre director and actor in Brussels and specialised in costume design. It was as a theatre student that he first learnt how to make hats and, after directing and designing costumes for quite a few theatre shows, he started to dedicate himself mainly to the world of fashion.
Years ago he made hats for Kaat Tilley, Guy Laroche, Yohji Yamamoto, and, more recently, Grace Jones; he developed a line of accessories for men and women that features hats, caps, gloves, jewellery, handbags and neckties, and also worked on interior design lines. Coppens has two boutiques, one in Brussels and one in Japan. The latter is particularly stunning, with rooms showcasing men and women’s clothing and accessory lines.
I quite like the accessories from Coppens’ 2008 Autumn/Winter collection, especially his black masks, sequinned gloves and hats sprinkled with buttons. One of my favourite collections remains Coppens’ 2005 Autumn/Winter, with its surrealist crossword gloves or piano and tiger shaped scarves. I find particularly intriguing Coppens’ accessories for men, especially his scarves with life-size prints of a man and the designer’s quirky ties.
Coppens also has the merit of having redesigned and reinvented elegant and classic hats for men adding to them unusual and striking details.
Those who liked the 2006 Spring/Summer collection and in particular his shirts with blown up prints of clown faces, can rejoice as Coppens has recently produced a brand new "Crying Clown" shirt for Designers Against Aids, a project founded in 2004 to raise AIDS awareness. 
All the shirts and sweaters produced for this project are made of organic cotton in a fair trade community in India with the help of German company Sense Organics.
I’m looking forward to seeing Coppens’ 2009 Spring/Summer collection and I hope it will be more "theatrical" than ever.
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