Blog Introduction

In analysing the individual Fastrack process, we will be focusing on two of the designers, Kyra Moon-Halfpenny and Kim Gush, both of whom were selected within the final four to be assisted further in their careers, but through very different looking ranges.

In assessing each of them we will be researching their respective backgrounds, their sources of inspiration and incorporating their personal reports regarding the ranges, but will also be questioning various sources, with varied backgrounds themselves, to understand the impact and reception of these collections within the wider audience.

P. Calefato begins a writing called The Clothed Body (2004), with a quote saying, amongst other things, that, “...from the external form of clothes one cannot infer the form of the thought they clothe...” taken from Wittgenstein (1922).

Whilst M. Maynard starts out his offering, Style and Communication (2004), with the words “All clothing is a form of communication...”

Within an article called Written Clothing, in The Fashion Reader, Barthes (2011) goes further in discussing the different formats that clothing is represented in these days. 

So from originally being conceived as an idea by the designer, to going into a physical garment warn by the models, to ending up as a runway show and a set of photos or a video, sometimes accompanied with worded reports, when finally presented to the audience, prospective client or possible employer, how does meaning manifest and communicate itself within these different incarnations?  Especially given the fact that neither is based on a well defined local identity, but rather compiled from various widely varied sources?

Michiel van Staden