KAREN MABON
This is a project on textile designer Karen Mabon. By: Navneet Singh, Department of Fashion Communication, National Institute of Fashion Technology.
KAREN MABON
Contents
About
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Know your Designer
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Design Phylosophy
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Design Process
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Chit-Chat with the Designer
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Products
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About Karen Mabon is a British based designer. Her unique array of silk scarves and jewellery give a strong sense of imagination, playfulness and individuality. After studying at Edinburgh College of Art from in London from 2010-2012. She then went on to design jewellery for several brands, including River Island and Margaret Howell, giving her a breadth of experience she describes as “invaluable in understanding how I wanted my own company to be positioned in the market�.
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She also went on to gain further industry experience, working alongside set designer Fred Butler, a time she happily recalls: “Working with Fred was so much fun. Something exciting would happen every day. We spent a lot of time making costumes for Lady Gaga’s music videos, which again was a totally different experience because they are designed to have a high visual impact but maybe only last for a few hours.”
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Establishing her own label in 2013 after attending London’s Royal College of Art, her work received instant recognition with followers around the world, coverage in titles such as Vogue and Grazia, and regular commissions from clients ranging from the V&A and Lush Cosmetics to the Natural History Museum and broadcaster Dawn O’Porter.
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Know your Designer Since the very launch of her label in 2013, her designs have been recognised globally by key fashion magazine titles, including Vogue and Grazia, as well as gaining the support of national and international stockists such as Liberty London and Harvey Nichols. Her success did not stop there though, as she’s created bespoke designs for the Freud Museum the Dreamland Theme Park and Anthropologie as well as gaining a noticeable attention of celebrities such as Taylor Swift and Kristen Wiig.
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By getting Shortlisted for Accessories Designer of the Year at the Scottish Fashion Awards in 2015, she continued to attract plaudits from near and far. Her designs are inspired by popular references from her childhood in the Black Isle where she spent many rainy days mmersed in the books, films and television. She combines these early references and everyday life with her wide-ranging passion for artists, photographers and designers, such as Bruegel, Hockney, Martin Parr and Ben Nicholson.
It is her vision to capture what she defines as “the romance of everyday�. Perhaps, what makes her collections so desirable is the thought, love and craftsmanship that goes into making each individual scarf or a piece of jewellery. She patiently constructs each composition from layers of hand-drawn images before combining modern techniques with traditional processes which allow her to achieve the rich textures which complement her bright, bold beautiful designs. Her scarves are printed in Italy using the finest silk and cashmere and focus on individuality and narrative with the scarf in three-dimensional form uppermost in her mind. Her decision to rebel against traditional symmetry means that each scarf brings to life a different perspective and unique story.
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Design Philosophy
Calling on a wide range of references, from pop culture and the artists that inspire her, to quintessential English pastimes and subjects so unbelievably ordinary their existence probably never even crosses your mind. Her work is a delicious fusion of eclecticism, detail and wit. For example, One scarf might see Tippi Hendren fleeing from a flock of seagulls, another a vegetable patch being ransacked by rabbits, another a traditional British seaside holiday scene. When depicted on accessories (or any garments for that matter) poetic and traditional scenes run the risk of looking overdone or dowdy, while tongue-incheek designs can easily slip into novelty territory. Between the all encompassing arrays of influences she employs, and their playful yet intricately constructed depiction, she toses the line between nostalgia and modernity just perfectly.
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Design Process
Her accessories are fun – who’s not going to crack a smile with Panthers at a party parading around their neck? This is no doubt helped by the design process involved in the creation of each piece, a feat as impressive as the fact that she managed to carve a niche for herself within the overcrowded accessories market. Each motif is constructed from layers of hand drawn images. Rather than using a repeated print, each design is a complete and individual composition, holding a distinct narrative and realized on the finest Italian silks and cashmeres. The jewelry pieces feature individual motifs from her painstakingly created scarves, offering the kind of mix and/or match potential. She set out to create pieces that captured the “romance of the everyday” and her quirky play on the mundanities of life does so beautifully.
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Chit-Chat with the Designer Karen Mabon’s designs are beautiful, bold and brash. All hand-illustrated, her silk scarves combine delicate drawing with playful and quirky aesthetics. With designs that cover everything from a British garden to a stationary cupboard, Mabon transforms everyday clothing into works of art. Her pieces have appeared in the likes of Cosmopolitan, Elle UK, Vogue and Harper’s Bazaar and she also produces clothing and jewellery. We speak to Mabon about her journey into the fashion industry and her favourite designers.
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How did you begin designing scarves? What was it that drew you to that item of clothing? I trained in Goldsmithing at the Royal College of Art in London but I was never cut out for making serious jewellery- I have really clumsy, fumbly fingers and I was always knocking over pots of gold dust. I found it really frustrating because I could draw a picture of exactly what I wanted to make but when I sat down to create it, it all went wrong! So, I tried to think of a way of combining drawing and jewellery to make “wearable artworks”. Then one day I saw the most beautiful old Liberty silk scarf in a vintage shop, it was a little peach coloured square and the texture of the silk was like the skin of a peach too, and printed in a grey line was a really delicate drawing of mussels. I thought it was was weird but it worked. And the rest is history! All of your designs are colourful and playful, where does the inspiration come from? I normally get ideas when I’m totally switched off and not thinking about scarves at all. Travelling is always great for inspiration, but never in the way you’d think! I visit all these exhibitions and museums and I am always convinced that it will really fuel an idea, then I’ll overhear a couple arguing in the airport on the way home and I decide to make a scarf about it. Last summer I was visiting some friends who live in Stockholm and and we were drinking beers in their flat and then the video for You Were Always On My Mindby the Pet Shop Boys came on and it was all I could think about for the rest of the trip. What do you think are the biggest challenges for new designers starting out today? I think there’s a lot of competition out there so it’s hard to offer something unique and compete in a saturated market. It’s quite hard balancing the realities of production with creativity; sometimes the things you really want to do are either too expensive or impossible to make, and you have to be quite restrained with product development, especially if you’re trying to make a career out of it. 11
Which designers have influenced you? My favourite fashion designers are Jeremy Scott, Meadham Kirchhoff, Kate Spade, Peter Jensen and Ashish, but I really like the notion of the artist as a designer; I like that artists approach design in a completely different way. Some of my favourites are Eduardo Paolozzi, Gary Hume, Tadanori Yokoo, Tom Wesselman and Hockney. ‘Weaving whimsical and surprising narratives throughout your work’ – would you say this is your trademark and please tell us where you find inspiration for your designs? I suppose it has become a bit of a trademark. I’ve recently tried to develop designs which are a bit simpler but I just can’t get away from colour and maximalism. I literally find inspiration from my work from everywhere which is probably why it looks like a mashup of Where’s Wally and Hieronymus Bosch… I do love a whimsical narrative. I come from the Black Isle in Scotland and everyone there loves telling stories, probably because there’s not much to do up there. I exaggerate everything and my work grows arms and legs too. “Leonardo DiCaprio’s mum bought one of my scarves. This means there is a slim possibility that our hands have both touched the same piece of silk. So we have essentially shaken hands.” How do you decide what will work well for example who thought gingerbread men and poodles could look so stylish! Ha-ha thank you! For me, I don’t think much has changed since I was a child in terms of the things I’m drawn to and the things I find deliciously appealing. Shiny plastic toys, sticky sweets, a fluffy poodle, icing dripping off the side of a cake… the things I like to depict are all quite sensory. I think colour plays quite an important role too – one of the first scarves I ever designed was a laboratory with pills and mice with ears, but because it 12
was rendered in sugary pastels, it looked more innocent. Similarly, colour can give things an ‘edge’ too. Do you enjoy commissioned work or do you prefer to free flow with your own inspiration? I like both! Commissions are fun because it’s always nice to be presented with an idea which you would never have thought of. But I think the balance works well – after doing a few commissions, I go back to my own work bursting with energy and feel like I’ve been set free. But I’m curious about things and different environments so any commission which comes with a site visit is always a winner.
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If you could create a design for any major world event what would it be and why? Taylor Swift’s world tour. Yes I am shallow but like everybody else I am completely obsessed with her – her stylist called in a few of my scarves (The Midnight Feast one with the foxes and the Swan Lake one) but I’ve never see her wear them and it would be my absolute DREAM. I hope she is reading the Radisson RED blog. Why wouldn’t she be? Last and a fun question, Describe your style. Day to day, a bit of Joan Baez meets Andy Warhol. When I’m going out to a party, Veronica Salt in the original Charlie and the Chocolate Factory. 14
Products
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Bibliography
https://www.karenmabon.com/ http://www.aestheticamagazine.com/ interview-fashion-designer-karenmabon/ https://www.radissonred.com/blog/ fashion/karen-mabon/ http://www.thenational.scot/ news/14861743.Fashion__Every_Karen_ Mabon_scarf_tells_a_story/