craftsmanship

How To Get What You Want: KOBA etextiles tailorshop

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Hannah Perner-Wilson and Mika Satomi are best known for their epic explorations in DIY etextiles and documentation on www.kobakant.at. Anyone working with etextiles will be familiar with the incredible resource How To Get What You Want.

Their latest project KOBA takes this work one step further and offers an open studio and shop front allowing the public to walk in and commission whatever wearable electronic garment they can dream up! If you are in Berlin, I recommend you pay them a visit.

I started 2018 in style, spending an inspiring week in the KOBA Schneiderei in Kreuzberg. Working alongside Hannah and Mika I drafted the block for my unisex modular jumpsuit collection (more on that later) as well as giving a talk about 'how do we know what we want? making fantasies come true' at their first #Shoptalk event. We collaborated on a prototype jumpsuit (for ..me!) and you can follow the design and evolving documentation here. In the belt are vibration motors which tell me north when activated - by jumping, of course. It also wakes me up by 'purring' if I have been stationary for too long. Watch the video below or check out their blog post to learn more.

You can follow the evolution of the tailorshop and ongoing documentation on the KOBA website. If you want to be inspired and lose yourself in a web of inspiration, I encourage you to follow the multitude of links in this post and explore their work. You won't regret it.

I will be going back to KOBA in March (after we have recovered from fashion week) with my partner in crime Bex to see what wonders have been dreamt up since this visit.. and to make custom jumpsuits for Hannah and Mika.

Anyone familiar with my clothing obsessions will know: jumpsuits are the way of the future. This allusory jumpsuit pattern (and the whole collection) will be open sourced and uploaded as soon as we have: made the different style samples, rubbed our beards thoughtfully, hated them, decided we love them, shot them beautifully, presented them officially and finally, refined the patterns and uploaded the content. No biggie. You can have the patterns for free and will also be able to order them from us. The future will be sexy and utilitarian and have options. We have one month to complete this mission. Watch this space.

leather fingerwaves for a Rebel Heart

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Last month we received an exciting request for leather headpieces for the flapper finale of Madonna's Rebel Heart Tour. Commissioned by the brilliant Arianne Philips (costume designer of Hedwig and The Angry Inch and Tank Girl <3), we made an exclusive piece from the Concrete Roses collection. A fingerwave hairstyle which can be styled in under a minute is ideal for the military precision of dancers' quickchange. The particular design Arianne chose was not in the lookbook.. for some mysterious reason. It was clearly destined to be exclusive to the tour and will now be known as the Rebel Heart headband.

This original design sketch was featured in a 'first look' article on WWD alongside her formidable roster of designers.  Big love to Arianne for including us in her epic design!

Rachel and Rebecca were joined by the talented Christian Warren Landon and made twelve pieces by hand in East London: 6 in polished black and 6 in pearl white. The carved and moulded leather fingerwaves are made using only European veg tan leather, water, traditional swivel knives and bone folding tools - and infused with a lack of sleep, an excess of swearing and a noble quantity of vodka.

These sculptural pieces were never intended to be made en masse. Instead the collection was designed around super minimal use of materials and tools, with all the emphasis on craftsmanship and human touch. How viable this is in the modern world is questionable. It is fascinating how we as consumers perceive the value of ornate craftsmanship, and how this in turn influences design practice. The collection was originally presented with this in mind. It was offered bespoke from the atelier and no wholesale orders were taken. So making a dozen in quick succession to a tight deadline was a baptism by fire as the process is tiring and intense, even for us maniacal leatherworkers.

However, you don't say no to Arianne and Madge! ;) So thank you ladies. The result was a perfect commission: pushing the material - and ourselves - to the limit.

 

DEATH MASK PROJECT

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The death mask project is an ongoing collaboration between Rachel Freire and fine artist Ben Ashton. The faces are moulded by Rachel using traditional leather techniques and painstakingly painted by Ben to eerie hyper-real effect. These age old techniques are our old school take on the Uncanny Valley.