In yesterday's post we looked at the power of geometry via the works of Conrad Shawcross and also mentioned his "Fractures", sculptures composed of hundreds of delicate geometric leaves.
In fashion when we usually think about "fractured" fabrics, our minds immediately evoke patchworked garments. Yet in these garments designers usually stitch together irregular pieces of fabrics in a variety of colours and patterns.
Anrealage's Kunihiko Morinaga has instead presented a different vision of fractured and patchworked fabrics for the brand's S/S 23 collection.
Showcased during Paris Fashion Week, the collection opened with a model in a structured dress with sculpted puff sleeves made with triangular and rectangular patches of washed denim.
Then followed more designs, from tops and sleeveless coats to dresses cinched at the waist with corset belts, from cropped jackets to long romantic dresses with leg-of-mutton sleeves, made with the same technique and employing 200 different deadstock fabrics from past Anrealage collections.
Though sustainability was high on the agenda, craft was the real protagonist of the show: the looks were indeed made in the brand's atelier by five craftspeople who sewed together thousands of scraps of fabrics (one look - a full-skirted dress with double-layered, wide sleeves - integrated 4,000 fragments of fabrics).
This exercise in mathematical and geometrical precision left you wondering if at the atelier they also used a computer modeling program to compose together the "fractured" looks as, even though they were made with tiny geometrical bits and pieces of fabrics, they still retained a great fluidity.
There was also an arty twist in the most colourful pieces that evoked the palette of Sonia Delaunay's geometrical works, while the designs in earthy tones gave you the impression you were looking at an aerial picture, a bird's eye view over a rural or a urban landscape.
In a way the fractured technique wasn't new to Anrealage as Kunihiko Morinaga has a passion for geometrical patchworks, and the silhouettes weren't unfamiliar for the brand as well, but this was a 20th-anniversary show, so it was also a way to take stock and ponder a bit on the history of the brand. Besides, there was also a twist in the collection.
Kunihiko Morinaga is known for his presentations often exploring the theme of duality or divided in two parts with models walking down the runway twice in the same design to show how fabrics may change colour or reveal a pattern when exposed to light.
In this case there were no changes in the colours of the fabrics, but, after an interlude of five all-black patchworked designs, the models walked again down the runway in the same designs they had donned in the first part of the show, but worn inside out. While on Gucci's runway Alessandro Michele worked with the theme of twins and otherness, here the repetition had one main point - showing the level of handicraft behind each design.
Morinaga loves the artisanal aspect of his designs, but also technology and this entered the collection via the open-ear headphones donned by one model and given to the audience as well.
Created by Japanese manufacturer NTT Sonority (the sponsor of the show), the headphones are designed to lay on the ear concha so that the user can still hear the outside world while listening to music.
And there was duplicity in that message as well, reminding us to find a balance between real life and digital life, like the Anrealage-clad heroine of Mamoru Hosoda's anime epic "Belle" (Ryū to Sobakasu no Hime) did in the film.
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