wunderkammer
Gabrielle Szwarcenberg
Got It Dog-Eared
Belgium 20250313
To designer Gabrielle Szwarcenberg, paper is a daily accomplice. The ultimate prototyping medium, it captures ideas in notes, it hides secrets in envelopes, offers future guidance, and prompts reflection through dog-eared corners of books. Her collection delves into childhood pursuits as rites of passage, celebrating how we transform boredom into ingenious creativity, from cat’s cradles and marble games to paper aeroplanes. Inspired by renowned 1960s beatnik Harry Smith, who collected over 250 paper planes now hidden in museum archives, she revived these artefacts through the coupé technique and by working on fabric as if paper. Embracing an art-for-art’s-sake ethos, the ephemeral looks provide an inadvertent retrospective of 20th-century graphic anthropology.
SELECTION MOTIVATION
The bold and sophisticated freedom with which the designer manipulates and shapes an idea, a material, and an imaginary world brings freshness and inspired insights. The skill with which the concept of a historical archive transforms into irreverent yet wearable fashion, immediate yet meticulously crafted, is a memorable and mature element. The garments embody a compelling design culture, one that feels close to the familiar act of working with paper patterns, yet is pushed by the designer towards daring aesthetic elaborations.
TECHNICAL DESCRIPTION
Short sleeveless dress fastened at the neck with a magnet, inspired by the cover of New York Magazine, April 29, 1968. Folded following the “Buzz” paper aeroplane model. Military cap, shoes in folded foam and rubber with paper plane motif on the front. Vogue Eyewear by EssilorLuxottica, in Top White / Opal Milk, adjustable temple, bio-based nylon fiber.
PHOTOGALLERY
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