Recent advanced technologies, along with the current Covid 19 pandemic, have meant designers have been challenged to adapt and utilise remote working skills to adapt to digital and forward-facing technological methods. Using creativity and both craft and digital methods to create new fashion design-based outcomes. Throughout this essay, I intend to explore the ways in which designers have adapted to, and utilised new technologically advanced methods to replicate the physicality and materiality of garments, turning towards interdisciplinary methods. I will be using a variation of sources to investigate further into this topic, utilising theories such as Guy Debord’s ‘Society of the Spectacle’ and Anneke Smelik’s ‘New Materialism’. These sources will support my investigation of the fundamental changes of new fashion processes, combining hand crafted techniques with digitally advanced methods and why this has become so necessary and relevant in today’s industry and society. I will utilise the visual analysis examples in this essay as a way to investigate the current adaptations of designers to new technological methods to both design and communicate their designs as a result of the unexpected covid 19 pandemic. I will effectively use my research examples to explore recent unique approaches to design within fashion, exploring material transformation as a result of a revolutionised technological society.
“The spectacle is not a supplement to the real world, an additional decoration. It is the heart of the unrealism of the real society” (Debora, 1977: 6).
Debord’s ‘society of the spectacle’ remains relevant to current fashion. It has always been a way of aestheticizing everyday life in a surreal way through image, providing escapism. The covid 19 pandemic has changed the platform of fashion in many ways, designers have quickly had to adapt to an almost entirely digital platform to present and recreate the physicality of a garment. The recent changes in technology have allowed designers to develop an interdisciplinary approach to every aspect of the design process, that has changed our interaction with garments. Debord’s theory of our distracted society, driven through image may now be irrelevant today, new technology and communication has altered the approaches towards fashion like never before.
“Debord’s descriptions were rooted in a Marxist critique of the commodity form as economic object; the overarching transformations of the 1990’s (globalisation, new technology and new communications radically altered its form”. (Evans, 74: 2003).
My initial argument in response to Debord’s theory of becoming outdated as a result of technological methods forming a new structure within fashion is supported through Evans’ ‘Fashion at the Edge’. Evans’ argues Debord’s theory has become irrelevant, fashion is no longer just about representation, it circulates in many different forms (Evans, 2003). Evans’ research of the movement within fashion throughout the 1990’s, consists of Hussein Chalayan’s AW98 and Walter Van Beirendoncks AW95 shows as examples of designers that challenged and contradicted Debord’s theory. Hussein Chalayan’s shows challenged Debord’s theory to be modified as a result of changes in technology communication through fashion design and the presentation of his shows, affecting how these take place. The shows contradict Debord’s theory, “In societies where modern conditions of production prevail, all of life presents itself as an immense accumulation of spectacles” (Debord, 1977:1). Debord characterises life as a world formed through image and illusion. Chalayan and Beirendonck responded to this idea through their shows, exploring the contrasts and connections between image, object, virtual bodies and real body, at a time of hybrid between technology and real life. Beirendonck and Chalayan are very relevant to today’s changes within the industry as a result of advanced technology, as they chose to use a hybrid of both handcrafted and technological processes, creating new ways of interacting with garments.
Similarly, to Evans, Anneke Smelik argues “The interdisciplinary field of new materialism highlights the role of non-human factors in the field of fashion, ranging from raw materials (cotton) to smart materials (solar cells) and from the textility of the garment to the tactility of the human body.” (Smelik, 2018:1). Smelik explores the ‘material turn’ within current fashion as a result of ‘new materialism’, her research examples investigate the new advanced technological methods within fashion as a result of new materialism (Smelik, 2018). Fashion has adapted to ‘hybrid assemblages’ of textile garments and tactile bodies. I feel this interdisciplinary field that fashion has entered uses technology to advance the relationship between the textility of a garment and tactility of a body and enhances the pivotal roles of technology that are now played within fashion.
An example of this may be Valerie Lamontagne’s research of ‘techno-fashion designer’ Ying Gao, in her article of ‘The artistry of Technologized Fashion’ (Lamontagne, 2014). “Gao could be said to question the very core of the positivistic drive of an increasingly technologized society” (Lamontagne, 2014: 64). Gao interprets technology as a positive element of our society. Using technology within her design process and outcomes as a response to our technologized society, wanting the public to react to her designs positively and utilising them within our society. Gao’s project “Walking City 1 + 2” (2007) used technological materials such as motion sensors as a fibre in the fabric. The sensors “trigger pneumatic systems in a dress, making the garments origami layers breath and move when someone is present”. (Lamontagne, 2014: 64). Gao’s practice interprets ways of how technological methods can be reinterpreted in fashion and how this can be beneficial in the future.
Similarly, to Gao, other fashion creatives have begun to weave between fashion as just being interpreted as a way to design functional clothing, to forming an interactive relationship between garment design, advanced technology and science. Another example of current fashion practice supporting this argument is Wong Lau and Yuen Lee’s research of new virtual 3D technologies, such as stereoscopic visualisation technologies, as researched in ‘Innovating through multisensory simulations (Wong Lau and Yuen Lee, 2018). Exploring new 3D visualization and multisensory simulation methods to create new experiences of fashion shows for the audience to experience. This contributes to new research into advanced technological methods to allow the physicality of garments in a fashion show, to be presented entirely digital, in their most interactive form. “This research aims to provide a chance for consumers to organize their own fashion show in virtual reality in order to enhance their product knowledge as well as facilitate their decision-making” (Wong Lau and Yuen Lee, 2018). Utilising advanced technology, researchers have developed a combination of interdisciplinary sources to form personalised and interactive virtual experiences within fashion. This supports Ying Gao’s practice, researched by Lamontagne, in her similarities of using advanced technology in an interdisciplinary format to create personalised interactive experiences with a garment, through senses and virtual touch through digital 3D design.
A similar example to Ying Gao in creating ‘techno-fashion’, is Anneke Smelik, Lianne Toussant and fashion designer Pauline Van Dongen’s study of ‘Solar fashion: An embodied approach to wearable technology’ (Toussaint et al, 2016). The authors argue that technologically advanced approaches to fashion such as solar energy, materiality and embodiment should influence design and reflection of wearable technologies created. Dongen’s design practice consists of the integration of solar technology known as photovoltaic cells, into fashion design, questioning the possibilities of incorporating this into garment design for functionality and sustainability. This is yet another clear example of advanced technological methods that may be used progressively more to our advantage in the future, adapting to a technologically driven society.
Figure 1: Iris Van Herpen’s ‘Skeleton’ dress (2011)
The “Skeleton” dress presented at Iris Van Herpen’s FW11 “Capriole Collection” is a strong visual example of a designer exploring fashion through advanced technological methods. The “Skeleton” dress at first appears more as a complex 3D object, or perhaps entirely digital. Herpen used 3D printed nylon to create the structure which has been designed with symmetricity, similarly to a human skeleton, to fit around the body. Although Herpen presents within haute couture, her technologically crafted processes are displayed through the use a 3D printing process, known as selective laser sintering, questioning the use of hand sewn techniques used within traditional haute couture.
I find the materiality of the dress very unique, as although it is displayed as a garment, there is no functionality or necessarily any meaning to the garment, it appears as a stagnant complex sculpture almost. I find this approach towards fashion that Herpen seems to utilise well very interesting, as it challenges the conventional norms of the process of creating a garment, as well as its preservation too. This elements within a design process can now be questioned more and more as a result of technologically advanced methods utilised such as this, where both handcrafted and machine-made methods are combined.
Figure 2: Lucy McRae ‘Future Survival Kit’ (2020)
I feel as though Lucy McRae’s ‘Future Survival Kit’ is an extremely relevant creative project in response to current societal changes as a result of the global covid 19 pandemic. McRae explores the changes in social interactions as a result of an increasingly technologized society. McRae uses materials combined with technology such as virtual and augmented reality, that intends to consume with the body with protection and affection in a variation of ways. I interpret ‘Future Survival Kit’ as a way of exploring the boundaries of textiles with technology, and handcrafted with machine made, to create overly cushioned and protected garments and silhouettes protecting the body. This then links to McRae’s conceptual ideas of being both physically and mentally protected from the reality of life which has been consumed as result of social media and advanced technologies. I find McRae’s practice unique in her approach to the topic of advanced technology, as it lies between the positive and negative effects of it, exploring ways in which it can be comforting and makes interaction easier in some ways, whilst creating a negative lifestyle of becoming consumed within technology, particularly during the current pandemic, by which people have had no choice but to adapt to a highly increased use of technology in many ways.
Figure 3: Fredrik Tjaerandsen ‘Augmented Atelier’ (2020)
Designer Fredrick Tjaerandsen recently collaborated with Microsoft through their ‘Augmented Atelier’ project, using 3D digital software to explore new digitalised methods in his design process. Tjaerandsen creates sculptural pieces using inflated latex, which can then be worn onto a body to explore the movement of the body and the spaces that surround it. The use of the Azure Spatial Anchors process on the 3D software allowed Tjaerandsen to replicate and modify the physicality of the inflated sculptures he designs. Tjaerandsen uses an iPad to modify elements of the design such as changes of shape to create the overall silhouette. I feel as though this is again an extremely relevant creative practice, using an entirely digital platform to create a design process which replicates the physicality of the structure. This also impacts the sustainability within Tjaeranden’s design process, as the entirely digital method means no materials need to be used throughout, therefore meaning the consumption and cost of materials are eliminated during the design process. Tjaerandsen’s collaboration with Microsoft, is a unique example of how the design process could vastly change as a result of advanced technological methods, especially as a result of the covid 19 pandemic, where designers have had no choice but to adapt to an almost entirely digital platform.
I feel as though my research has supported my argument in how new methods have contributed to a more flexible and dynamic way of using advanced technological methods to visualise the physicality of a garment and the ways of interaction between garments and people. My research examples have allowed me to investigate into a hybrid of processes from creative practitioners within fashion, combining digitally advanced technological processes, as well as technologically advanced machine processes.
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