Urban Luxury

In light of the previous project, my fascination with drawstrings grew even more. The source of my obsession with drawstrings can be traced back to Grace and Mabel project in the first semester of my third year. Drawstrings give me the freedom of experimenting with volume, form and proportion in different parts of garments. To keep this project fresh and exciting, I developed a series of fabrics samples. I introduced shapes from my primary research on the flat surface of fabrics and created circular channels on the surface of the fabrics. Through this channel, I passed a string of cord and ended up a circular drawstring that could be reeled-in or left loose. On some samples, I cut away the middle piece, on others I layered another fabric beneath. This play on shape and textures became my focal point for this project.

Volume is an obvious element visible in this project. I researched possible trends that I could connect to my designs and the oversize trend was the best choice. It is contemporary and gives me the opportunity to play with proportions using the drawstring. I looked into several collections from recent catwalk shows and found some good ones which I used as references in my folder and sketchbook. Amongst these, I found Rick Owens 2017 collections had a lot of oversize and padded details. He exaggerated sleeves, shoulders and layered garments to create volume that looked like it was consuming the models. His choice and mix of fabrics of textures also made the collections interesting and aesthetically pleasing.

I decided to work with the round silhouette, especially on the sleeves of my garments. This silhouette is inspired by the round nature of the Jellyfish. I was influenced by this sea creature for my previous project, Diversity. The round silhouette is a modern element incorporated by many designers in the last few years. Technically, this challenges traditional garment especially when it comes to pattern making.