Spring Summer 2010: behind the scenes of Spring Summer 2011

The preparation of this season has so far been the easiest and the most exciting! Not only have we (my team and I) created the most exciting and new collection, but we've also had the most exciting press thanks to Felicities, and have met some super interns. This season I've also collaborated with three really artisitic first year jewellery designers from Birmingham's now famous jewellery school, for whom I was asked to set a live project.


Spring Summer 2011 "Eternal Delight", the collection:

This season is a HUGE move away from the sentimentalist themes that I've been toying with in past collections. Since moving to the UK, my reading choices changed as I "settled into a new landscape". The "Debutant", "Eccentric Girl" and "Nocturns" culminated in the anti-nostalgic "Pilgrim" theme last season- the baby at the end signifying change and perhaps even rebirth. This coming season, my muse enters a new and exciting phase, a new experience. "Eternal Delight is named after the famous William Blake quote:

"Energy is an eternal delight, and he who desires, but acts not, breeds pestilence."

I think it is one of the most provocative of Blake's plates, incredibly powerful and esoteric.I'm a huge Blake devotee. I think he is is the ultimate artist.

For the coming season, I'll be showing my collection in a presentation. I really want people to have a good look at the intricate working of the pieces and especially the jewellery pieces.

Summer 2010 Interns:

What a fun, brave bunch of gals! This season, I implemented a proper mentoring situation. Not only have the interns made copious amounts of cups of tea, but they have also completed full portfolios of work, spent many a night drawing their feet or other body parts (!) (five life drawings were to be submitted every day, two of them proper finished pieces) and had a reading list of 15 important books to get through. They bitched and moaned and not only did they get through books like 100 Years of Solitude, the Garcia epic, or London Fields, or Last Exit To Brooklyn, but based certain projects on books like Skin Lane by Neil Bartlett which is amazing!

They looked at work beyond the pre-requisite Helmut Newton and Mappelthorpe and explored avenues beyond their imagination. I am incredibly proud of them and they are ALL (5 of them) going to Paris with us in September for sales! May I add that all five of them look incredible in Jacob Kimmie! look out for them if you're over...

Press:

Shingai from the Noisettes, front covers, the feather jacket on a waitinglist with stylists, and other press we cant mention...just not yet...watch this space!!

Tom and Dom:

About two months ago, I met a young married couple, Tom and Dominika Sochacki, from Poland who inspire me no end with their drive and passion for what they do. Tom, who studied photography in the UK, is shooting my SS11 campaign and has the most incredible eye. My favourite work of his are portraits of Dominika which portrays the most incredible intimacy void of being crass or sugary. Dominika has completed a degree in communications and manages Tom's PR. I love their story about their tough background and their incredibly grown-up approach to life in Britain. For the last three years of their study in the UK, they've both worked at Oceana over weekends to support themselves- Tom in the coat check area, and Dominika wiping up vomit till three in the morning. They are only 22 and 23 years old.


Jewellery School live preoject:

This was really excting! After setting the project based on my SS11 theme, the students had to present their pieces on "a type of futuristic hyper-femininity". The pieces were completely bonkers! Some submissions looked like space-age contraptions while others lost the plot (in a good way!) altogetether. Stand out pieces were by a girl called Ellie, who designed a look that I can only describe as "metal fabric caught in wind!". Unfortunately, one collaborator of the final three, will not be taking part. The seriousness of the project was meant to eventually prove how incredibly pressurised and dyanmic the fashion industry is.

Watch out for Alice Welsh and Fiona Maria Ross. They are going to forces to be reckoned with. They're designing my jewellery.