The fashion observer

Arnem Mode Bienale

 > Every two years the Arnhem Mode Biënnale presents the state of affairs in fashion design at an international level. In the space of four years the fashion biennale has evolved into a major trend-setting event with a robustly international orientation.  Arnhem Mode Biënnale is an initiative of the City of Arnhem and ArtEZ Institute of the Arts .

Participants of the event include most of  international trend-setting designers such as Boudicca, Rick Owens, Maison Martin Margiela, Come des Garcons, Kei kagami together with emerging new talents such as Andrea Ayala, Iris van Herpen and a large list of promising new designers.

Arhem Mode Biennale presents ” Form” , “which is currently setting the tone in fashion. During the biennale dozens of fashion designers demonstrate that there is more than one way of attaining exceptional forms. The starting point for Jil Sander’s Summer 2008 collection was geometric forms, such as the triangle, circle and rectangle. Moulage (creating patterns in three-dimensional space) is the basis for the feminine gowns by Lanvin. Thom Browne designs men’s fashion inspired by his admiration for existing forms. These and other interpretations of the aspect of SHAPE will be explored in the guise of clothing, images, texts and historical references”.

Afhem Mode Biënnale ( 6 june-6 july) . Complete information about participants and events at Arhem Mode Biënnale web.

Yoshiguro Yamagata´s photo courtesy

> Yoshikazu Yamagata is a japanese designer who studied fashion design at Saint Martins School in London, and returned back to Japan. He created the brand Writtenafterwards which is a fashion label for ladys’ real clothing, that provides communication of an education, society, culture and environment into fashion.

He has been commited to different projects that express new kind of fashion freely, and now is using his new approach for teaching fashion in Japan. ( You can read more about this project at Diane´s Pernet  blog).  

Yoshikazu Yamagata Earthbackpack. Photo courtesy Diane Pernet

  He has a particular and vision about fashion that I´ve extracted from an early interview to the designer that I´ve considered could be a guideline for new designers in search of fashion as self-expression : 

” I would like to work in a different style from existing designers’ works. I guess it comes down to self-expression.  I think due to the quick development of internet technologies, the way of expressing oneself will change and differ. Does it mean people will not express themselves throughout clothings in the near future? …. New designers will easily get snapped off by the huge companies, and after two weeks of the newest fashion show, the copies will be in the high street shops everywhere. Even in such situation, I don’t want to give up attracting people through fashion and expressing fashion in different ways. We might need to change the system of fashion from top to bottom though… Maybe we will find some possibilities for the future through the changes in society, such as the intimacy between customers and designers through use of the internet... From clothing, space, system to picture books… I would like to realize many possibilities to seek new platforms of fashion”.  ( Complete interview to Yoshikazu Yamagata here ).

Yoshikazu Yamagata is presenting his new collection next week at Arhemmodebiennale.

For a complete overview of Yoshikazu Yamagata you can visit his web.