Like everyone else, we have been looking inward and yearning outward.
We revisited our years at art school, drawing on a lot of different sources. Mark’s best friend was the model Rebecca Ghiglieri, who was very famously the muse in Antonio Lopez’s illustration of the Charles James “shrimp gown”. We had assignments at the Charles James exhibit at the Brooklyn Museum, the Zandra Rhodes exhibit at Parsons, the Costume Institute at The Met, and dressed the fashion shows for every designer in New York. We both were drawn to the most extravagant and fantastical aspects of our education.
We feel that we are coming out of the tunnel at last, and that it is time for the Grand Gesture again. We looked at those Post-War couture influences through a 1980’s lens, for the silhouettes and volumes and techniques. So much happiness has been postponed, and it is time to be exuberant again.
The colors are from Cecil Beaton photographs and our own imaginings – ebony, tobacco, scarlet, ice blue, celadon, rose, mica, olive, blush, midnight. Fabrics are re-imagined classics, engineered to look heritage and feel modern. The shapes are both fluid and firm, controlled and extravagant.
We are looking backwards, but not going there.
-Mark Badgley & James Mischka
