Red-Hot: Art To Wear 2008 Recap

Nina Garcia would have had a field day with Art to Wear this year. In the years since Art to Wear began, Project Runway, in its 5th season, has turned all of us into amateur fashion critics.
The production values of the show, have become so polished; the professional MC, excellent sound and lighting, and a nice big stage made for plenty of great seats. The new designers have a large mountain to climb- high standards were set by previous years designers that have gone on to professional careers like Ashley Newsome, Jonathan Gatlin, Chris Jordan, and Breigh Stanfield. But last Thursday the kids came with their A game. Many of them lived up to the design standards put forward in years past and a few of them might have eclipsed their predecessors.

A warm spring night last week laid across NC State’s Court of Carolinas.  We have seen recycled materials, tribal wear and wings before, but there was a fresh air even to these old themes. Gone was many of the ‘crafty’ looks we have seen- but designers integrated post modern sensibilities and showed off the influence of heritage, modern media and celebrity culture.

Liz Bradford brought a consistent sense of tailoring to recycled materials.  Her pieces included layered beer cans and cigarette packs in carefully constructed patterns that held traditional dress forms. 

Jessica Monique George had colorful tribal wraps and dresses on women of both model and more domestic form- combined with heavy drum beats and flashy makeup to convey a colorful modern look rooted in African culture.

Justin De LaBlanc, the sole modernist of the show presented some of the meanest models we saw all night.  The girls ignored the audience, scolded us and fainted in front of our eyes in an effort to showcase what a black dress best shows off- the attitude of its owner. 

Ultimately it was young designer Katelyn Wells who stole the show.  Her traditional clothing was well tailored, but it was her many winged pieces that rocked the crowd.  These outfits were no angel wings ala Victoria secret, instead they were large wings with internal skeletons and riggings.  The models could use their hands or legs to control the positioning of the wings in ways that complimented their movement or pose.  The young models strutted out striking power poses that sent their wings out stretched like water birds. 

Slideshows

Apologies to Designers not listed.  Technical issues caused the loss of some of the early pieces