I first learnt to sew by taking apart garments and putting them back together myself. I've always had a great appreciation for bringing new life and new meaning to old garments. Designers who I greatly admire who use this as their main process of design are the likes of Ellen Larson of Hodakova, and Marine Serre. Both have a great talent for reimagining what a garment's new function can be, and this has greatly influenced my work as a student of fashion design. As someone who is non-binary, I've always noticed the gendering that happens to clothing, through culture and media. I greatly appreciate the work of Bianca Saunders, who brings more feminine elements of womenswear, such as drape and softer textile use, into her menswear. With my graduate collection titled 'Gender Trouble', I tried to resolve this issue in my way. Not by necessarily removing associated gender, but in attempting to find silhouettes that don't rely on a gendered body to 'fit' right. But also by taking aspects associated with gender and reimagining themselves in their alternative. This collection is about my early experiences in understanding my identity and how I would use clothing to disguise my body from others, through oversized garments and heavy textiles. But then also contradicting this attempt with very soft, light, and opaque textiles, but still through the warped pattern placements of garments in the wrong order, making any aspects of their utility useless to the wearer. What I want is for the wearer to be conscious of the garments that they are wearing. Conscious of how they put them on, close them up, move in them, walk around in them, as I would have been when using clothes to hide myself.
