East End Review

Category: FASHION

  • London Fashion Week – five East London designers to watch

    Charlie May SS15 designs. Photograph: K Bobula
    Charlie May SS15 designs. Photograph: K Bobula

    London Fashion Week SS15 showcased a bounty of new and emerging design talent, who brought a heavy dose of daring and DIY to the landscape of British fashion. New names such as Faustine Steinmetz and Charlie May, and young brands including Louise Alsop and Claire Barrow dominated the schedule. The atmosphere and aesthetic emerging for SS15 was about fun and fantasy, but also craft and technical innovation, and these designers proved that they had it all, shaping what British fashion is today.

    Kult Domini

    East-London based footwear label Kult Domini presented Babylonia, their aptly named SS15 collection inspired by the earth and its minerals. Vegetable dyed leathers in midnight blue and dusky pink were used for the uppers on shoes, along with chlorophyll-like cellular prints and crocodile skin textures. The label, which has gained recognition for its wooden stacked heel and open-back brogue, have the shoes produced in Italy using fine Italian leather to ensure quality. But this is not precious footwear, Kult Domini shoes are made for pacing the pavements.

    Look out for: The Kult Domini croc platform pool slider.

    Faustine Steinmetz

    Denim and ready-to-wear designer Faustine Steinmetz deconstructed the American classic and any conventional notion of it in her SS15 collection, which featured hand-woven and hand-dyed jackets and jeans in ethereal matted threads and puckered fabrics. Washed out denim tones and iridescent silver hues made for a light otherworldly aesthetic. The designer, who works on handlooms in her East London studio, referenced the mega couture houses of her native Paris through playful branding on pens, sweets and plinths that read ‘Faustine Steinmetz – Whitechapel’.

    Look out for: Security tag jewellery in scuffed silver, made in collaboration with jewellery label Niomo.

    Charlie May

    Charlie May presented a collection of wearable loose-fit trousers and drop-shouldered T-shirts in a palette of white, the softest blue and camel brown. Inspired by her upbringing on the Devon coastline, the sea breeze is almost palpable in the botanical-print tops and easy sliders, created in collaboration with Adidas.

    Look out for: May’s painterly leaf print tops.

    Minki Cheng

    Graduating from Central Saint Martins in 2012, Minki Cheng’s first full collection, for SS15, was made up of simple, clean jackets and dresses with pleating and sheer panels, in charcoal, black and navy. Using neon rubber, to create contours on soft organza slip dresses, brought an interesting contradiction in surface texture.

    Look out for: Minki Cheng’s drop pleated sleeveless dresses.

    Claire Barrow

    Emerging designer Claire Barrow used her sci-fi influenced vision of the future, involving deadly viruses and medical wonder women, as the inspiration behind her SS15 collection. Disregarding the norms of warm-weather wear, Barrow adopted her gothic DIY aesthetic to create leather vests and silk dresses depicting cavemen-style paintings of Chagall cats with human faces and other unidentified creatures.

    Look out for: Barrow’s cat-adorned zip-up biker vests.

  • London Fashion Week to spring into action

    Faustine Steinmetz design - photo Sanna Helen Berger
    Faustine Steinmetz design. Photograph: Sanna Helen Berger

    Spring Summer 2015 womenswear collections will be revealed at London Fashion Week in mid-September. Just as we slip back into coats and sweaters in preparation for autumn, designers are lifting spirits with their preamble to 2015.

    Autumn Winter 2014 collections consisted of a sixties-by-way-of-2014 aesthetic, all miniskirts and gogo boots in textured contemporary fabrics. Seventies shades of browns and orange and nineties oversize knitwear also made for popular inspiration. Now, fashion aficionados await the next season eagerly, ready to discover what the mood will be for 2015, and which new designers will be making it into the foreground of British fashion.

    Keen to make the most of a season’s commercial capacity (and with the optimism of Spring/Summer still a strong selling point), some designers have taken to creating pre-Spring Summer collections. Antipodium revealed their Resort 2015 collection (aka pre-Spring Summer) some months back, and used this opportunity to debut the work of new Head of Design Daniel Mcilwraith. The tangerine tones of their AW14 collections faded into peachy hues for Resort 2015. Autumn’s miniskirt lengths were adopted for shirt-dresses, while light knits and printed silk shirts brought renewed energy in tones such as baby blue and kiwi green.

    Utilising the practical needs of the summer, London Fashion Week will for the first time have a dedicated area of the Designer Showrooms for emerging swimwear and lingerie designers. The British Fashion Council will host a pop-up showroom, exhibiting collections by NEWGEN designers – this annual talent identification scheme, sponsored by Topshop, gives emerging designers financial support and an opportunity to gain recognition and exhibit at London Fashion Week.

    For SS15 a number of East London designers have been given NEWGEN status including denim stalwarts Marques Almeida and new kids Faustine Steinmetz. The latter is an innovative denim and read-to-wear brand working out of a studio in East London where the team spin, dye and weave their own fabrics, producing exquisite handmade and handwoven pieces. This will be Faustine Steinmetz’s debut at London Fashion Week and the Parisian designer has taken inspiration from the mega couturiers of her birth place. Analysing the high-end luxury industry, and its shift towards mass consumerism, seems fitting coming from a brand that believes in the bespoke and handmade.

    East London designer Phoebe English will be returning to London Fashion Week to present her take on Spring Summer 15. Of what to expect from the collection, English says: ‘The SS15 collection has elements of both tailoring and broken forms, and includes print collaborations with Dalston-based illustrator and print designer Helen Bullock.’

    Autumn is all about new beginnings and looking forward. London Fashion Week SS15 with its new talent, and new mood, is set to do just that.

  • East End designers celebrate summer at London Collections: Men

    Kit Neale SS15 designs at London Collections: Men
    Kit Neale SS15 designs at London Collections: Men

    East London designers playfully drew on the simple pleasures of a summer holiday at London Collections: Men, the capital’s menswear fashion week. Reinterpreting the luggage and holiday attire of Brits abroad and shaped by their own brand identity, a handful of designers tapped into our nostalgia for the summer experience.

    Master of print Kit Neale incorporated symbolic holiday motifs from family holidays on the Med and a Neapolitan ice-cream colour palette into this season’s spring/summer ‘15 collection. The Ravensbourne alumnus printed a medley of potted cactus plants onto heavy white cotton board shorts and jackets, while the in-flight emergency manual became the basis of another print, the designer accentuating the cartoon-like nature of the instructions. Neale gained access to the Coca Cola archives for this collection, and reworked the classic logo on candy-coloured diamond print shirts. Trousers were rolled up (prepared for a paddle), hair was 1950s quaffed, and sweaters were worn over the shoulders, completing the carefree hyper-holiday aesthetic.

    Playing with the same themes to different ends was sportswear inspired duo Cottweiler. Matthew Dainty and Ben Cottrell took us on the entire journey, from airport departure lounge through to sunburnt noses and a feeling of ‘I don’t want to go home’. The collection opened with Cottweiler’s signature tracksuits, this time employing a palette of dusty grey and white, and was worn by a set of pale models with wheelie suitcases. The collection evolved, as did the models’ tans, into shorts, sleeveless vests and t-shirts nearly all in crisp white, with accents of colour in swimming pool blue piping, and Mediterranean terracotta jackets. Short shorts, funnel necks and the deployment of burnt reds and greys brought a touch of 1970s nostalgia to the aesthetic, while the overall collection made for a wholly contemporary and unique reinterpretation of travelling to foreign climes.

    For SS15, J.W. Anderson featured knitted tops of pastoral British landscape scenes – rivers and lakes, complete with threatening skies, evoking memories of camping holidays or hours spent in the car, watching the rolling countryside pass by. Astrid Anderson transported us to Japan for her collection, exploring her own fascination with the art of sumo, by creating kimonos in soft sunset shades of orange and pink.

    It was back to basics this season, with designers drawing on precious personal memories and evoking ours through a focus on travel, holidays and kicking back.

  • Designer profile: Phoebe English

    Phoebe English
    Phoebe English

    Phoebe English is a young womenswear designer who has gained recognition for her contemporary yet organic aesthetic, which grew in part out of a keen interest in experimental construction techniques and surface textiles. She graduated from Central Saint Martins with an MA in Fashion in 2011, and the same year formed a partnership with one of her earliest customers, Rose Easton, who now acts as Creative Director. Easton English incorporates the Phoebe English brand, now stocked in DSM, Bluebird and internationally.

    Soon after graduating you joined forces with Rose Easton to form English Easton. This must have been an important business decision for a new graduate. What sparked it and what has it meant for you?

    I made a dress for Rose, for a birthday. I think she could see I was a bit swamped. We made friends and decided to do a small collection for Vauxhall Fashion Scout, to see how it went. After that we received an order from Dover Street Market and the very next day we registered our company.

    You are involved with the Centre for Fashion Enterprise in Hackney and gained a place on their New Fashion Pioneer Programme, then progressed on to the New Fashion Venture Programme in June 2013, which helps designers identify areas of growth and provides financial subsidy. What has the latter meant for the development of your brand? What do you think the centre offers young designers?

    The Centre for Fashion Enterprise (CFE) has been invaluable in the development and growth of my business. I cannot express enough how much the support, advice and mentoring has helped us; it takes you from being a singular designer to a fully-fledged business. The CFE offers information to designers that it’s just not possible to find elsewhere, from how to source and build relationships with your manufacturers to cash flows. Every single aspect of your business is nurtured. We are currently working with an e-commerce developer mentor.

    Do you find the changing landscape of East London inspires or informs your work? 

    East London and Hackney is such an important aspect of how I work, it’s where I have had all of my studios and it is also where I have lived for the last five years. It is forever changing and filled with an abundance of incredible people. Nothing inspires me more than simply walking between my home and the studio –  there is always an amazing variety of characters to see along the way.

    Your AW14 collection saw you reinterpret modern tailoring, with elegant yet organic jackets and dresses. What inspired this collection?

    AW14 comes from lots of places, from images of early Cornelia Parker to traditional upholstery and mattress making fabrics, and also from wanting to express certain feelings of both extreme strength (wide heavy ruched straps of thick cotton) and hopeless vulnerability (fine, almost invisible nets.)

    CORE is a season-less collection that you produce, turning the transience of fashion on its head. How did this project come about about?

    It is a small collection of pieces, which are made in our typical materials of rubber and muslin, and also incorporates some simple matte latex pieces. They are all very simple but aim to fit into outfits you already love to wear. It really came about because of friends and clients enjoying particular pieces we had done in the past; and also from pieces that Rose and I enjoyed wearing more on a daily basis than for special occasions.

    CORE seems to explore the life span of clothes and sustainability of fashion. Is this something that interests you?

    Yes, I am very interested in timeless beauty, it is very important for me that the clothes can work both in London and across the world. The aesthetic must be transferable, not just London-centric.

    Any new collaborative projects in the pipeline?

    I will be working with my dear friend Helen Bullock for SS15. We have worked and studied together but this will be the first time we have collaborated on a project. Helen has such an opposite structure to how she works, which is so exciting for me. I want the work we do together to be like a breath of new air in the collection.

    What can we expect for Phoebe English SS15?

    Films, surprise projects, e-commerce and a brand spanking new collection!

    www.phoebeenglish.com

  • Graduate Fashion Week review

    Student style: Graduate Fashion Week
    Student style: Graduate Fashion Week

    Truman’s Brewery on Brick Lane hosted Graduate Fashion Week at the end of last month, showcasing 2014’s crop of fashion graduates, and over 40 universities and art schools. The event celebrated cultural and geographical diversity and the incredible craftsmanship and innovative design emerging from across the UK.

    On a warm opening Saturday, Graduate Fashion Week was humming with students, tutors, parents and fashion industry members, and with a general air of chaotic excitement, which seems fitting for an event that showcases young people at the start of their career in a famously challenging industry.

    The labyrinth-like Truman’s Brewery was divided into compact exhibition spaces for each of the universities, who significantly chose different approaches to exhibiting work. Major player on the fashion course world-stage is Kingston University, who went for tasteful wooden and industrial fittings and showcased leather book-bound sketchbooks of their students’ work – not a garment in sight. London College of Fashion had tutors sketching and illustrating on easels, the walls of the space becoming a live and evolving exhibition of fashion illustrations on loose sheets of paper. Edinburgh College of Art had created a shop-cum-showroom, bursting with garments made by students. The theme here was knitwear, representing perhaps Scotland’s age-old association with yarn production and knits.

    A handful of universities were given the opportunity to exhibit their work in catwalk-form, including Manchester School of Art, Birmingham University and Kingston, among others. 

    The University of East London took to the catwalk on the opening day, bringing the collections of no less than twenty new BA graduates to the runway. Highlights included Kamara Appleton’s menswear collection of geometric boarders in metallic hues, on tunics and coats. Not surprisingly for a university located in the urban heart of East London, sportswear reigned strong. Leanne Beckford presented an androgynous series of navy and slate boiler suits and oversize sports coats, accessorised with giant bobble hats, while Veronica Peduzzi-Davies presented an accomplished collection of cyber sportswear featuring towelling, teddy-bear motifs and puffer jackets, paying tribute to London Fashion Week favourites Christopher Raeburn and Nasir Mazhar. Hollie Tarrier used carpet-bag floral and jacquard techniques on putty and white base colours, bringing a contemporary feel to old fabric patterns, with Tianyi Li’s collection of black lace, costume-like cape dresses and headpieces and veils bringing the show to a memorable close.

    Graduate Fashion Week acknowledged fashion graduates from across the UK and the cultural diversity that informs their craft, providing them with a place to show off their talents in the heart of London’s creative East End.

  • Wild and Woolly craft shop opens in Lower Clapton

    Anna Feldman in her Wild and Woolly shop
    Anna Feldman in her Wild and Woolly shop

    Whenever I walk past a wool shop, I stare in the window and a have a brief moment of longing. Perhaps it’s because I had a fling with knitting as a child, perhaps it’s because I’m simple and bright colours attract me, like a magpie.

    Or perhaps it’s because, as Wild and Woolly owner Anna Feldman suggests, knitting and crafting offer a remedy to the mental and existential fatigue brought on by spending half your life prodding a computer screen.

    Anna packed in her years working in web design, but has opened Hackney’s newest knit shop to indulge her passion for the craft. “It’s a departure from working online,” she says. “Being online all the time has its frustrations, there’s something very real about making things with your hands, that people can enjoy.”

    True to that departure from the digital, every available space on Wild and Woolly’s walls is dedicated to the handicraft – no modern trickery can bypass the patience it takes to weave a ball of wool into ear muffs.

    The most advanced contraption available inside is a wooden hand-cranked mechanism for balling up yarn. There are more variations of needle than I knew were necessary and more types of wool stuffed into the displays than I knew existed, from Aran through to Alpaca. Anna sources as much of it locally as she can.

    The Alpacas aren’t even from the Andes, they’re lucky enough to live in the Lake District. Some of the goods are sourced as close as Leytonstone and Shacklewell Road.

    The ambition is for Wild and Woolly to have a collaborative local role. “My idea is having a place where people come and knit, the cliché is it’s a close knit community” she laughs, conscious of the pun. “It’s a place where people can come and work it all out together”. Far from being a woolly pipe dream, Anna brings forward her experience working with victims of torture for the Helen Bamber foundation. There she found that having a craft to work on helped people open up and have an identity beyond their trauma. “There is something therapeutic that happens between the lines,” she says.

    The shop will hold classes from beginner’s level to advanced, taking you through tea cosies all the way to woolly jumpers, whether it’s for your nephew’s first birthday of your a Christmas pub crawl. With the prospect of the week’s work ahead in front of a computer screen, I bought some needles and yarn of my own. Anna even taught me how to start my thread. A true testament to her patience, believe me.

    Wild and Woolly Shop
    116 Lower Clapton Road
    Hackney
    E5 0QR