In the last few posts we looked at architecture as an inspiration for fashion projects and, among the fashion designers inspired by this discipline, there is Iris van Herpen.
The Dutch designer recently posted on her social media pages her latest project - a unique dress that she dubbed "Dimensionism", created in collaboration with glassblower Bernd Weinmayer.
The design is reminiscent of a tutu, but, rather than being made with tulle like conventional ballerina costumes, it was three-dimensionally blown in glass.
The dress looks as if it were made with water, and it could be considered as a development of van Herpen's 2010 design for the "Fashion & Architecture" exhibition at Amsterdam's ARCAM. In that occasion the designer developed with Dutch firm Benthem Crouwel Architekten, a water-dress inspired by Jan Benthem and Mels Crouwel’s project for the renovation of the Stedelijk Museum that included a sort of bathtub-shaped extension.
In that case van Herpen imagined to play with the water that the tub may have contained and on the effects it may have created if a woman's body had entered it. The result was a Plexiglass-like synthetic material used for the main design and for the wing-like effects that gave the illusion the wearer may have been hit by the contents of one or two buckets of water that had frozen around her body. In this case instead we have a more defined silhouette entirely made in sustainable glass.
"I have always dreamed to make a look that reflects the purity and beauty of water, it's a continuous thread throughout my work," the designer stated on her Instagram page, adding, "This look pushes the boundaries of all the techniques we have explored till now."
Born in Germany, Weinmayer studied scientific glassblowing and runs his studio from Austria. The recipient of numerous awards, Weinmayer is a unique glassblower known for his masterful flame-worked borosilicate glass techniques which he uses to create detailed, realistic and surreal glass art.
He also incorporates dynamic gas plasma light in his flowing clear glass forms to create magical glass light sculptures that glow with brightly coloured effects. This is not the first time Weinmayer collaborated with van Herpen: in 2019 he made for her a 1.5 m sculpture of a face mask using the rod net technique.
Will this collaboration continue? Let's hope so, "Dimensionism" may not be ideal for a ballet, but it would be amazing if one day the designer would create a costume for a ballet in glass incorporating the effects Weinmayer obtains integrating gas plasma light in his sculptures.
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