Push It Real Good

If the blog looks a bit sketchy over the next few days, it's because I'm pounding out haute couture reports over for Dazed Digital.  Instead I'll just bombard your eyes with pics bonanzas instead.  100+ photos in one blog post is probably some sort of blogging upload faux pas in the eyes of some, but I've gone ahead and committed the sin anyway for the sole reason that I simply couldn't narrow down my selection of faves from the Central Saint Martins BA show.  It was the first time I had seen the BA show at the new Kings Cross campus (so impressive is the space that I go into fits of student jealousy everytime I'm in there, despite the protestations of former Charing X dwellers) as last year I covered the show through Steve's eyes.  I've realise it's been graduate heavy of late but June has been a rewarding month where the results of three-four years of hard work have come to fruition and it would have been a shame to omit the Central Saint Martins show, when I had a good eighteen or so names, whose collections gave me the jitters in my seat.  As with any student grad round-up, it's never going to be a definitive best but this hopefully demonstrates the breadth of intriguing ideas of a school that rightfully earns its reputation as one of fashion's premier breeding grounds.  On another CSM note, I'm so happy that the Within by Howard Tangye Kickstarter book project has reached and exceeded its goal of ¬£30,000.  The book will now have the addition of pretty ribbons and a head and tail band and I look forward to touching up its tactile glory when it goes to print.

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Beth Postle – There must be something in the Postle blood that incites visually stimulating creativity as Beth Postle happens to be the younger sister of talented knittist Jenny Postle, one half of Leutton Postle.  Postle opened the show with a troop of Picasso-esque canvases printed and shaped into walking works of art inspired by 1920s Soviet costumes.  As Postle graduated from a fashion print discipline, it's that eye-catching 2-D work that counts.  It's to her added credit that she managed to conjure up sculptural feats out of miles of printed Alcantara (Postle's material sponsor).  They were extreme but they were exactly the bang required to begin proceedings of what would be a general showcase of "More is More".  

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Jolene Fung – This is an instance where first glances at a show can truly be deceptive.  I, along with other people incorrectly labelled Jolene Fung's collection as printed paper.  In fact, Fung had printed her own plastics that had the matte texture of fibrous paper from a distance, and more importantly the plastics are made out of recycled rubbish bin bags so there's a pertinent sustainable element.  Inspired by foldable furniture, Fung created her own interlocking seams so that everything is foldable and can be flattened out and now sewing is involved.  The mid-century also infiltrated the collection with its nods to Dior's New Look especially in the hats and cinched-in-waisted skirts.  Again Fung may be a fashion print graduate but she shows she has chops in innovative pattern cutting too, making brilliant use out of a topical material choice.     

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Carrie-Ann Stein – I'm a sucker for sad seaside towns, having visited Steve's humble hometown of Westgate/Margate.  The run down parts of town and time-frozen storefronts have a charm to them that Carrie-Ann Stein has captured in her knitwear collection of postcards depicting Blackpool.  Using knit-weave techniques, representative of Stein's native Lancashire's weaving heyday in the 19th century, she juxtaposes tradition with her digital prints of the back streets of Blackpool.  The texture of the knit gives the photographic images a fuzzy nostalgia-tinted quality but she exaggerated the colours to heighten the cheer of what are can be seen as bleak streets.  

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Nathaniel Lyles - Nathaniel Lyles got the crowd going with his choice of soundtrack of the Clothes Show theme song and similarly his highly accomplished knitwear collection was a throwback to 1960s/70s kitsch and TV shows characters like Fran from The Nanny or Eddie from Ab Fab.  Inspiration aside, it's Lyles perfection of knitting metres of specifically coloured copper wire which is highly impressive.  His blocks of colour form pieces in a complex jigsaw puzzle, sometimes layered up in Tetris blocks and rectangles or in zig zag formations which curve around the body.  It's a technique that could well be further honed under Lyles own name.    

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Cassandra Verity Green – **Warning** No goldfish were harmed in the making of this collection.  Well at least from my knowledge anyway.  I feel for Cassandra Verity Green whose expertly crafted knitwear collection made out of pastel beading and moss-esque mohair was brushed aside in favour for tabloid headlines from the raging NSPCA over her use of goldfishes swimming around in her plastic bowl backpacks (incidentally, one of my most liked/commented Instagram pic of all time).  I'm pretty sure Green used the fish humanely and responsibly.  In any case, it was Green's beautiful judgement of colour and texture rather than goldfish swimming in a bowl, that caught my eye.  I loved all the references to retro synchro swimmers too.  

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Matthew Bovan – There was more textural experimentation from knitwear graduate Matthew Bovan who also used plastic beads combined with laser cut latex and scribble pattern machine knits.  There was a deliberately sick edge to it all, evidenced by Bovan's inspiration imagery.  You could read the conflicting range of emotions in Bovan's abstract scribbles, which he translated into incredible collage pieces of knit, beading and laser cutting.  Trying to make direct sense of it all would be futile.  Instead it's best to just let all of it wash over you like a tide of exuberant and furious outpouring.    

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Mao Usami – I had to giggle when Mao Usami's collection went down the runway.  It was just hilariously slovenly.  And I mean that in the best way possible.  When you read this little monologue, you begin to understand part of what Usami's award-winning collection was all about.  "I asked my white T-shirt : ‚ÄúWhat is the fashion?  What is the humor seriously?  What is the sexuality?  What, What, What‚Ķ. What?  You never answered but I hope you are well."  Watching the show, I couldn't help but think of Charlyne Yi's character in the film Knocked Up and the extreme and exaggerated versions of her geeky slacker attire.  Socks come stretched, polo shirt dresses are bunched up and sweaters are oversized and the slouch has been perfected into something that's almost appealing.  I say almost but Usami is definitely challenging notions of what's aesthetically appealing and you couldn't help but be swayed by the charm of it all.

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Yang Yang – There's something very earthy about the hues of indigo blue and Yang Yang's collection explored that particular shade and associated textures to the max. Looking at traditional Chinese minority tribe costumes, something which I also fell in love when I was last in China, Yang has created a collection of layered up true blues, sometimes with pinstripe, sometimes checked and added comfort-inducing bulk with paper bag waists, oversized rucksacks and generous shirt proportions. I loved it for its simplicity and directness.

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Rym Beydoun – The collection that felt lightyears fresh was Rym Beydoun who sought to combine her Islam faith with fashion in a way that didn't feel contrived or gimmicky. It was wholly successful because Beydoun looked to use modesty as a source of inspiration and by incorporating the veil fully into garments, the clothes centred around intriguing silhouettes and an alluring uniform of sorts rather than become a religious statement. Beydoun's inspiration images are telling of the sort of rebellious Muslim muse, she imagines wearing the collection including images from films like Persephone and activists. It made me think of an encounter I had with a Muslim girl I snapped on the tube dressed in full on Lolita costume. Different aesthetic of course from what Beydoun has created, but they certainly break the mould and push the sartorial possibilities whilst observing religious values.

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Edward Marler -I believe Ed Marler was the only graduate to model his own collection in the show and if you've picked up on any of his style fixture antics, either through this Closet Case article on Dazed Digital or through streetstyle sites, then it's easy to understand why Marler did so. I couldn't find his portfolio at the exhibition but his inspiration is possibly his own daring sense of eclecticism and gender bending. Day and night, masculine and feminine, tackiness and elegance blur into a cacophony of trailing layers in ghetto pink, Britney n' Justin denim, leopard faux fur and delicate laser-cut lace. It's all stupendously self-explanatory and presents a like-it-or-lump-it brash attitude that Marler himself conveys with his personal style. It's a method of designining as you intend to dress which is not a bad path to follow when you're as outre as Marler.