The recent Turkish Airlines' Istancool festival by Liberatum organised in Istanbul – current European capital of culture – at the beginning of July, featured an impressive calendar, fusing art, literature, fashion, music and design, and brought together people as different as Zaha Hadid, Jefferson Hack, Kim Jones, Michael Nyman, Gareth Pugh, Philip Treacy and Gore Vidal.
Interestingly enough, the event took place just a few days after the results of the ANDAM prize were announced.
The ANDAM finalists – Alexandre
Vauthier, Bouchra Jarrar, Calla Hayneswere, Francesco Scognamiglio, Hakaan Yildirim, Mark Fast – were all different one from the other, yet all of them were strong and boasted very interesting curricula with years spent working for prestigious fashion houses.
In the end the €220,000 prize went to Turkish designer Hakaan Yildirim, voted by a jury comprising Carine Roitfeld, LVMH’s Delphine Arnault, Alber Elbaz, Musée de la Mode curator Pamela Golbin, Colette’s Sarah Lerfel, Jefferson Hack and Opening Ceremony’s Humberto Leon.
A friend of fashion photographer Mert Alas (of Mert & Marcus fame), Hakaan presented his first London show in February, charming fashion critics not only for the famous models sashaying down the runway (from Natalia Vodianova to Lara Stone and Mariacarla Boscono) and for the celebrities scattered around the audience, but also for his designs.
The collection, styled by Edward Enninful, featured indeed designs based on precise silhouettes and characterised by a sculptural touch.
Jackets incorporated structured shoulders; strips of wools seemed to be wrapped around the models' bodies with architectural precision, leaving here and there the skin exposed and turning it into part of the design; leather jackets were intricately constructed weaving together hundreds of leather strips.
Throughout the collection Hakaan played on contrasts, using sheer and matte fabrics, alternating sharp designs with softer ones decorated with ostrich feathers and trying to reach a balance between glamorous and tailored designs.
Interesting cutting techniques, pleated mini-skirts clashing with sci-fi elements incorporated in the rigid shoulders and in the wings of fabrics protruding from the hips (very Things to Come…) also proved intriguing.
Hakaan first started his career by winning while he was still a fashion
design student, the first award at the Young Fashion Designer Prize organised by Istanbul’s Textile and Apparel Exporter Associations, and there are high expectations for his next collection now that he has won the prestigious ANDAM award.
Yet, this very Turkish
summer didn't actually start with Istancool or with Hakaan's award: in mid-June Milan-based Turkish designer Umit Benan showcased his third menswear
collection.
The presentation was actually much better than the one for
his "Retired Rockers" collection.
Moving from his roots and from his father’s style, Benan entitled the collection "Home,
Sweet Home", and included in it quite a few designs that echoed traditional Turkish costumes.
Once again the designer showcased his collection through a tableaux vivant, with men of different ages sitting at tables, talking, playing backgammon or holding in their hands tesbih or prayer beads.
Playing with relaxed and ample volumes Benan came up with dropped-crotch pants,
striped caftans and shawl-like capes with kimono sleeves in light summer fabrics and a palette including, anthracite greys, rusty oranges, dark browns and electric blues.
Benan also managed to mix in the collection contemporary and modern menswear: keeping an eye on Turkish traditions and with an eye looking outward, pushing himself out of any specific geographic boundaries he also included in his collection double-breasted jersey jackets, bib shirts and black tuxedo jackets with a rather elaborate draped lapels.
The latest Turkey-themes success story took place last weekend during the Altaroma event.
Last Saturday Turkish-born but Milan based Erkan Çoruh won with a poetical collection the "Who Is On Next?" (womenswear section) competition.
Born in
Istanbul in 1976, Çoruh studied fashion design at Istanbul's Fine Art Academy, winning with his collection the first award at the
Young Fashion Designer Prize and the IAF International Designer Award before moving to the Domus Academy to take an MA in Fashion Design.
In his Autumn/Winter 2010 men and women's wear collections, entitled "The Men & Women of Allah", Çoruh moved from the Islamic traditions mixing them with Western fashion, using the draped motifs created by a garment such as the chador for shirts, coats and jackets.
Çoruh was instead inspired by a very special muse in his Spring/Summer 2011, Iranian artist and film maker Shirin Neshat.
Neshat's life, that clash between her Iranian origins, her experiences of the Iranian revolution and life in the States represent the perfect synthesis between Islamic traditions and Western culture and also offer Çoruh the chance to present a new vision of femininity.
Throughout the collection – entitled "Radical Beauty" that won the competition, Çoruh created harmony through clashes between Islamic fashion and urban trends, sparking a dialogue between them.
The designer took the chador and deconstructed it, incorporating it into a top or creating decorative 3D motifs appliquéd on sleeveless tops.
It will be interesting to follow the developments regarding these designers of Turkish origins, but it will also be interesting to see how Turkey will react to all this attention.
Previously ignored by the global fashion scene, the country is now considered as a hotbed of young designers with fresh and innovative ideas in mind.
It is maybe too naïve to hope that this attention will also put more pressure on the country and help it sorting out vitally important issues such as freedom of expression.
Many of us may have forgotten the trials against prize-winning novelists such as Orhan Pamuk, against journalists (writer and sociologist Ismail Besikci; journalist and publisher
Hrant Dink, killed in 2007; Ismet Berkan, editor in chief of the Radikal newspaper; the Radikal columnists Erol Katircioglu, Murat Belge, Haluk Sahin, and Milliyet columnist Hasan Cemal) and publishers (Fatih Tas, owner of Aram Publishing; Ahmet Onal, owner of the Peri Publishing House; Abdullah Yildiz, editor of Literatür).
As I said, it would be naïve to hope that, through fashion, we could solve human right issues, help prosecuted writers, fight censorship and sort out the tensions over the Armenian genocide or the Kurdish situation.
Surely the fashion industry is not a department of the United Nations or fights side by side with the International PEN for freedom of expression.
Yet there are quite a few designers out there who are tackling interesting topics and issues – even political, religious and social ones – in their work, and I'm positive that they will be able to directly or indirectly help us challenging many beliefs, prejudices and preconceptions.
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