{"id":5082,"date":"2020-10-28T17:29:21","date_gmt":"2020-10-28T06:29:21","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/graziamagazine.com\/?post_type=articles&p=179302"},"modified":"2020-11-05T22:18:59","modified_gmt":"2020-11-05T22:18:59","slug":"one-persons-trash-fashion-upcycling-new-wave-grazia","status":"publish","type":"articles","link":"https:\/\/graziamagazine.com\/us\/articles\/one-persons-trash-fashion-upcycling-new-wave-grazia\/","title":{"rendered":"One Person’s Trash"},"content":{"rendered":"
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1\/OFF Paris<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

Francesco Risso had somewhat of an epiphany during the COVID-19 lockdown period. Following his Spring 2021 showcase, the gregarious Marni creative director told reporters that he and his team had used the pandemic\u2019s indoor sentencing to procure new-season cuts \u201cat home [out of] blankets [and] curtains.\u201d The scrappy, Fraulein Maria-esque nature of such limitations then resulted in an unexpected vision \u2013 a collection of raw-edged coats and dresses garnered from the Marni archives. Seasonal elders from the Italian label that Risso reconstructed using old fabrics then varnished with lashings of expressive slang and abstract graffiti. This was his \u201cMarnifesto,” as he labeled it, a tribute to fashion\u2019s most unlikely luxury uprising.<\/p>\n

Upcycling in practice is, of course, nothing new. Every teenager worth his or her high school sewing license has fused a homemade sleeve to an old denim vest. Or appropriated a dress out of a spare sheet and some pin-tucks. The nineties made a sport out of scouring local thrift shops for a five-dollar winner. Unearthing old-season, any-designer, anything meant formals could be rife with second-hand slip dresses and friends could bond over flea market tees and vintage jeans.<\/p>\n

However, the stranger times of nowadays are reviving this bygone era of recycle-chic, rebranding it less hand-me-down<\/em> and more hand-me-up<\/em>. Last year, the abhorrently wasteful ethics of the fashion industry were revealed to the world and sent designers spiraling. The well-publicized statistics around landfill, water usage and underpaid labor at the hands of the billion-dollar industry caused both an overdue reckoning and a marketing nightmare. Luxury labels and fast fashion alike were forced to overhaul practices and align their focus with a more sustainable, less gluttonous future. In doing so, the responsibility revolution began. But then, the pandemic hit, and suddenly, the lowering of consumables became as much about conscience as it did about scrambling to keep profits above water.<\/p>\n

So, now the fashion world tilts on a brave new angle. Not only shining a light on the high-end collections whose stories endorse upcycling practices \u2013 everyone from Virgil Abloh to Raf Simons to Stuart Vevers has professed their allegiance \u2013 but on the indie labels whose primary ethos comes from the repurposing of otherwise wasted goods. It\u2019s these excitingly artisanal newcomers who are paving the way for a type of neo-luxury. Many now hosted by premium online department stores once only home to brands that cut the cookie as required. Their pieces, mostly made individually and without specific size or season, are dropped as ready and bought by those with the quickest click.<\/p>\n

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FLIP IT AND REVERSE IT
\n<\/strong>Ren\u00e9e van Wijngaarden knows a thing or two about value. Before co-founding premium upcycling label 1\/OFF Paris, she was busy spreading the zeitgeist at pre-owned luxury online marketplace The Vestiaire Collective as head of brand partnerships. \u201cI was just really inspired by seeing all the pieces we leave behind even though fashion always comes in circles. Why do we keep buying new, when there are designer pieces and work wear with such beautiful craftsmanship and fabrics waiting to be destroyed?\u201d she told GRAZIA. In partnership with Xuan Thu Nguyen, an established couturier and invited member of La F\u00e9d\u00e9ration de la Haute Couture, the Dutch duo started 1\/OFF Paris last year. Since then, it has become a type of poster child for what luxury upcycling looks like. Inspired by the theatrical foundations of couture, pieces include an inside-out Burberry trench coat, a half-half houndstooth \u201cdouble blazer\u201d and oversized oxford shirts pleated and gathered to create corseted silhouettes. Given the caliber of pieces they source, slice and remaster, 1\/OFF is a renegade of restriction. However, the women\u2019s aesthetic has become a go-to, with a distinct sense of wearability not usually achieved by a genre based on salvaged vintage. And, with it now being stocked in places like Selfridges and Harvey Nichols, what could have been relegated to quirk is now firmly in reach of the everyday customer. \u201cDue to mass production and globalization, everyone can buy the same brands and products in each city. Therefore, I believe the demand is growing for more unique pieces that can really speak out your identity.\u201d<\/p>\n

Concept-style upcycling is fast becoming part of a widespread shopping psyche. Companies like Hong Kong\u2019s The R Collective and denim regenerating brand Re\/Done have championed the fight against landfill since 2007 and 2014 respectively. Both partner with established brands and young designers to push the cool-factor for pre-loved wares. Re\/Done, who call themselves \u201cthe new American Luxury\u201d are known for collaborating with Levi\u2019s on reinstating 501s while their 2019 capsule with Italian \u00fcber brand Attico realized a sell-out range marrying modern couture to thrifted LA party dresses. This attention from mainstream is certainly helping to normalize the upcycling trend and beckon a new customer. Wijngaarden says \u201cwith the experience of this year I think the customers of 1\/OFF are ambitious for their passion, and curious to [see] what is next. I feel they have a certain guts to do things in their own way. They stand for what they believe in and [are] therefore looking for ways to express their identity.\u201d<\/p>\n

IT’S DIFFERENT, BUT LIKE GOOD DIFFERENT
\n<\/strong>When Julie Pelipas set out to name her new label, a typo caused a Freudian slip. The Ukrainian fashion editor and influencer decided, however, that this unexpected upcycling of the brand\u2019s name was in fact serendipitous. And so, Bettter (with three t\u2019s) was born. Pelipas\u2019 signature style is a master-stroke in proportion. Her tall, athletic frame draped in variations of upholstered men\u2019s tailoring has become a favorite for street style snappers and PInterest\u2019s most-wanted boards. Coming from a family of seamstresses, Pelipas began tampering with second-hand men\u2019s suits as a way to find pants long enough to fit and to have them sit just as she wanted. Before long, French fly pleated trousers worn with wide-shouldered blazers and oversized button-down shirts became synonymous with her Instagram persona. So, when Bettter launched in June of this year, despite the lockdowns and the economic meltdowns and all the working from home, the first range \u2018Drop 00\u2019 sold out instantly. The capsule collection of slouchy three-piece suit sets, all with varying degrees of cut-outs and strap fastenings, would have anyone mistaken that the pieces were crafted from scratch. However, in her what-Phoebe-Philo-did-next style Pelipas\u2019 first venture instantly dispelled any myth that regenerated fashion can\u2019t be covetable.<\/p>\n

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Credit: Marni SS21<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

WHEN YOU KNOW, YOU KNOW
\n<\/strong>Anyone who’s led a career within the fashion vacuum could understand how being privy to its relentless wastage can become catalyst for an antithesis. When former Marni design director Molly Molloy and former British Vogue fashion director Lucinda Chambers decided to turn their trade to a sustainable operation in 2018, Colville was born. Their unique pieces don\u2019t take on a particularly vintage character so, as a result, upcycling ingredients are basically indistinguishable. Electric color blocking on minimalist cuts blended with the timeless appeal of asymmetric shapes have a distinct Marni influence. But it\u2019s the notes of cultural print and texture that profess its individualism. Colville upcycles using repurposed materials but incorporates pieces from local projects in Columbia, Morocco and Mexico too. There is a special-ness that comes from pieces that bring stories from far and wide, and from long established players whose place in the industry is now utterly of their own design.<\/p>\n

\u201cIt\u2019s slower fashion, it\u2019s all those things that we believe in, and that you can give something another life, longevity, and it\u2019s also buying with a conscience,\u201d said John Galliano while dissecting his fall 2020 show for Maison Margiela<\/a>. Entitled \u2018Recicla,\u2019 the collection of optimistic utility used crafty regeneration to create a kind of joyous fairytale cosplay. Almost as though the challenge to reuse had given the formerly disgraced designer an excuse to load his pieces in a couturier way. And he certainly seems to be relishing in it. With the wisdom that comes from perspective, any fashion industry veteran would concur that cultivating fashion without burdening the earth seems the only conscious way to continue.<\/p>\n

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Credit: (Top to bottom, left to right): Chopova Lowena (Belt), Maison Margiela FW21, Colville FW21 (Colombian Social Project), Maison Margiela FW21, Marine Serre SS21, 1\/OFF Paris, Colville FW21 (Colombian Social Project)<\/figcaption><\/figure>\n

DOES THE FUTURE HAVE A PATCH ON THE PAST?
\n<\/strong>What do traditional Bulgarian fabrics have in common with rock climbing apparatus? Unless you\u2019re already a purveyor of London based label Chopova Lowena, chances are you\u2019d assume not much. But Emma Chopova and Laura Lowena are one of the frontrunners in the futurist space of artisan upcycling and their looks are a kooky customization of both. Their mismatch method is ingeniously refreshing. Tapestry patchworks worked into harlequin prints and organ pleats savaged by sourced leathers, hooks and vintage sneakers. You\u2019d be forgiven for thinking it\u2019s a post-modern costume installation. A folkloric fusion that dips into Bulgarian tradition while wrenching it back to urban culture. As a brand already snapped up by luxury heavy hitters Matches Fashion and Farfetch, futurism is a burgeoning space for upcycling. Bred as kind of wearable art, its possibilities are broad and exciting. Central Saint Martins alum Patrick McDowell spent his tenure under Christopher Bailey experimenting with discarded Burberry fabrics, some of which he now (along with recycled firefighting accessories) incorporates into his young label. While Dutch fashion-challenger Duran Lantink has made a name for himself mashing together pieces from labels like Louis Vuitton and Gucci, relishing in the decimation of class culture within the industry. It\u2019s the \u201cnew order,\u201d as he calls it. But perhaps most unadulterated of all is Parisian upcycler Marine Serre. A creator of absurdist, confronting couture with a post-apocalyptic narrative, Serre is credited by some as the founder of the current movement. Her vantage is that of an \u201cecofuturist\u201d and her prescient upcycled collections give a pedestal to pragmatic wears usually leveled for utility or sport. Spring 2021 gives a lead to abstract biking wear, for example, in response to the rise in cycling since the pandemic began, while her crescent moon-print body stocking made from recycled jersey has been worn by everyone from Beyonc\u00e9 to Kylie Jenner to Dua Lipa.<\/p>\n

This bohemia of (re)thinkers, with fashion borders set far from the edges of expectation, is rewriting the rules for the future of desirable fashion. Driven by a unique creativity that comes via the art of customization and repurposing, they\u2019re challenging the rest of us to follow (their splendidly upcycled) suit.<\/p>\n

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Top Video Banner: Pinko Reimagine Collection by Patrick McDowell<\/span><\/p>\n

“ONE PERSON’S TRASH” was first published in the eighth edition of GRAZIA International. Purchase your copy here.\u00a0<\/span><\/a><\/p>\n","protected":false},"author":294,"featured_media":5083,"template":"","format":"standard","categories":[17,16],"yoast_head":"\nOne Person's Trash - Grazia USA<\/title>\n<meta name=\"description\" content=\"Is fashion upcycling the disruption movement we need? 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