Approaching Waste and the Self through Aesthetics: A Study of wabi-sabi
Shipra Chandran MA Textiles (Knit) 2019 Tutor: Jenna Rossi-Camus Word Count: 8455
~ To my father and grandfather; your never-ending encouragement and wisdom is what pushes me to fight through struggles every single day; you have set an incredibly high bar for men and I hope I find someone who puts their family ahead of everything else, just like you do .
To my mother and grandmother, your undying love and aection is what helps me see light at the end of the tunnel; you have set an incredibly high bar for women and I hope I can emulate just a tiny fraction of the strength you carry. ~
I love you.
Contents : 1. List of illustrations
Pg 4
2. Abstract
Pg 5
2. Introduction
Pg 6
3. How do I get out of my head?
Pg 8
4. Waste not, want not.
Pg 10
5. History of deconstruction in apparel and the implication of ‘wear-and-tear’
Pg 12
6. Forging their own path - Rei Kawakubo and Yohji Yamamoto
Pg 14
7. THE Sweater.
Pg 15
8. Western ideal of imperfection - Rise of Martin Margiela
Pg 16
9. Knitting is an emotion, my emotion
Pg 17
10. Darning on knitwear : Examining the ‘Wabi-sabi-ness’ of it
Pg 18
11. Examination of a knitted swatch using ‘The Fashion System’
Pg 20
12. Making a-mend-s
Pg 23
13. ‘Snags’ in the analysis.
Pg 24
14. Casting-off !
Pg 25
15. Bibliography
Pg 26
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List of illustrations: 1. Figure 1. - Failure exemplified by the Dubied knitting machine - Numerous knots due to an undesirable increase in tension, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
2. Figure 2. - A screenshot from the movie trailer of ‘The True Cost’ 1
3. Figure 3. - What started it all: Inspired by the movie ‘The True Cost’, this mini-installation depicts waste that can’t be contained in the bag and ends up spilling out, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran. 2
4. Figure 4. - The infamous wool sweater, 1982 : Kawakubo thinks of the fabric with “holes” in it as being a kind of lace. 3
5. Figure 5 and 6. - Martin Margiela sample cultures and strains, made for the “9/4/1615” installation at Brooklyn Anchorage, New York, 1999. 4
6. Figure 7. - An Ode to the Imperfect: A darning sample by Bridget Harvey, displayed as part of the Open Studio in Sackler Centre, V & A Museum, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
7. Figure 8. - Absence: The omission of elements can play a role which is meaningful, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran
8. Figure 9. - Right that wrong : A sample of my own work; a knit swatch with four types of defects - (from left to right) ladders, grease stain, drop needle and loose loops at the end due to improper needle take-up, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
9. Figure 10. - Set right : A continuum with the above image (Figure 9), where mending has been done around the defect so as to: a. Highlight the imperfection b. Prevent the stitches from dropping to increase durability of the fabric, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
10. Figure 11. - Black hole: Staring bleakly back at you, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
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4
‘The True Cost’ is a novel documentary film that reveals the dark underbelly of the fashion industry - its social and environmental issues. 1
The ‘waste’ (here) comprises entirely of discarded yarns and swatches found in the Dubied knitting lab at the Royal College of Art, London. These are just a week’s worth of rejected samples! 2
3
Leonard Koren, New Fashion Japan (Tokyo: Kodansha International, 1984), p.117.
Kaat Debo, Rebecca Arnold, and Sarah Mower, Margiela: The Hermès Years (Lannoo Publishers/ Racine, 2017), p.15. 4
~ When people ask, ‘Is that wearable?’ It makes me happy because it means it’s interesting to them. ~ Issey Miyake 5
Abstract:
This dissertation explores themes that can potentially improve environmental issues present in the knitwear industry. I have chosen to study the prospect of visible mending on fabric during the knitting itself than on worn-out garments, to prevent fabric wastage before it even hits the market. This is done through studying concepts related to how mending can be used as a tool by designers who knit the fabric themselves, and people in the industry who ‘correct’ the garments before they are shipped to the respective companies.
On that note, this paper does not quite provide concrete solutions to the various problems regarding the current state of waste in said industry, because it is outside the domain of possibility for a project that aims to tackle this issue on a scale of such large magnitude. But on a micro-level, I use analysis of my progress (in visible mending) through reflective writing that shuttles back and forth between failure, sustainability and finding oneself. I find links between relevant subcultures, designers, waste and semiotics and gauge their connections (both positive and negative) with wabi-sabi. Roland Barthes’s work has had a preponderant influence on almost every aspect branching out from the main theme of my dissertation.
This paper sets the stage for the next plan of action i.e, questioning people who have various interests, on their idea of what ‘acceptable fabric’ is - which consequently helps me learn their likes and dislikes.
I hope that in addition, it would give me tactile solutions to work with for the rest of my Master’s Degree.
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5
5
Koren, New Fashion Japan, p.110.
~ What I have been trying to do, and what I have probably done, is to make clothes that have seem to have existed for a long, long time. In reality they never existed. I am not a designer who creates fashion aesthetics. I make style out of life, not life out of style. ~ Issey Miyake 6
Introduction: i make a mistake then worry and rage i throw it to waste inconsolable, i lose
[i switch]
i make a mistake then stop and think i mend it
to save peaceful,
i win
In continuation with the above poem I’ve written,
I ask :
What is perfection?
Do we need this (idea of) ‘perfection’ in our lives?
How do I reduce the amount of yarn/fabric going to waste?
Is acceptance of failure the answer? If not, can ‘failure’ be amended to look like ‘success’?
There are numerous quotes on failure leading to success; but can failure BE the success itself?
Given below is an extract from the book ‘New Fashion Japan’ :
Everyone does fashion. You might not know what you look like but rest assured, other people do. They are judging and evaluating the kind of person you are by their set of fashion criteria. Fashion is of immense importance in our lives, judging by how much it takes up time, energy and money. We look to clothes to assert our individuality,, to increase our attractiveness, to express our affinity for a certain ideology and to enhance the meaning of our lives.7
I introduce the primary concept of this dissertation by stating a simple definition according to Koren - wabi-sabi is (provisionally) defined as having 'primitive art characteristics, i.e earthy, simple, unpretentious and fashioned out of natural materials. It is a particular type of beauty.'8 But this is only the basic interpretation, and wabi-sabi is so much more than that. It is a way of life; a way that deals with layers and feelings, levels and responses, surfaces and sentiments. As the artistic mouthpiece of the Zen movement, this art is built on the precepts of simplicity, humility, restraint, naturalness, joy and melancholy as well as the defining element of impermanence.9 For Westerners, the closest English word to wabi-sabi is probably rustic/simple/artless, or unsophisticated — but, while it is often the initial impression many people have when they first see a wabi-sabi expression, this represents only a limited dimension of the aesthetic. It is either dismissed or misunderstood.10
6
Koren, New Fashion Japan, p.12.
7
Koren, New Fashion Japan, p.4.
Koren, Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers (Point Reyes, Calif: Imperfect Publ, 2008), p.21. 8
9
Andrew Juniper, Wabi Sabi: The Japanese Art of Impermanence (Boston: Tuttle Pub, 2003), p.5.
10
Koren, Wabi-Sabi for Artists, Designers, Poets & Philosophers, p.21.
The market for objects labelled under the ‘bad/worst’ category is not very recognised. They are often subject to being preconceived as ‘artsy’ or ‘high end’, therefore the concept is not something that is likely to be seen as ‘easy-to-implement’ in daily lives. In my daily life as a knitter on a ‘Dubied’ knitting machine11 - a machine that makes the fabric susceptible to grease stains, holes etc. from broken needles, yarn entanglements and other hindrances, it would be fascinating to see how acknowledgement of the defects could lead to design variables.
The underlying theoretical framework of this dissertation makes use of Roland Barthes’s observations, to better explain the employment of semiotics to observe designers, subcultural aesthetic and the polysemy of holes in the fabric. Through inductive and deductive research, various theories are looped together to relate prevention of waste, views on imperfection and subsequently what said imperfection implies on a garment.
Wabi-sabi is an aesthetic philosophy that is intangible and shrouded in centuries of mystery. It clearly does not yield easily to a definitive, one-line interpretation.12 But throughout this paper, I try to make sense of this enigmatic concept and portray it through tactile means by doing what I do best : spinning a yarn.
I mean knitting.
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7
A type of hand-flat knitting machine, it is also used by students at the RCA. It is operated by hand and hence could make the fabric attuned to the identity of the individual knitter, if they chose to. 11
12
Juniper, Wabi Sabi: The Japanese Art of Impermanence, p.5.
~ Sometimes I think, ‘What is life?’ Well, life is very short. Sometimes you make mistakes and sometimes you are successful. It’s your life. C’est La Vie. Of course I try my best and strive for perfection but sometimes I try and make something that is very rough or unfinished because if I don’t I will die in madness pursuing an impossible ideal. ~ Kansai Yamamoto13
How do I get out of my head ? The idea was to create an efficient, waste-reduction system while also balancing aesthetic appeal. Frustrated with waste accumulating with no yield and also looking at fellow classmates trying to deal with the amount of unsuccessful effort; much thought was put into how I could make peace with the mistakes I made, rather than knitting fabric just to ‘get it over with’. This method could potentially reduce the time taken to complete a project as well as offer new design.
Figure 1. Failure exemplified by the Dubied knitting machine - Numerous knots due to an undesirable increase in tension, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
Unbeknown to myself, it was a quote from Oscar Wilde that set off this particular train of thought :
“I have no more desire to define ugliness than I have daring to define beauty; but still I would like to remind those who mock at beauty as being an unpractical thing of this fact, that an ugly thing is merely a thing is badly made, or a thing that does not serve its purpose; that ugliness is want of fitness; that ugliness is failure, that ugliness is useless, such as an ornament in the wrong place, while beauty, as some one finely said, is the purgation of all superfluities.
There is a divine economy about beauty; it gives us just what is needful and no more, whereas ugliness is always extravagant; ugliness is a spendthrift and wastes its material; in fine, ugliness, as much in costume as in anything else, is always the sign that somebody has been unpractical. So the costume of the future in England, if it is founded on the true laws of freedom, comfort, and adaptability to circumstances, cannot fail to be more beautiful also, because beauty is the sign always of the rightness of principles, the mystical seal that is set upon what is perfect, and upon what is perfect only.”14
Ugliness.
Beauty.
Failure.
Perfection.
Beauty = Perfection // Ugliness = Failure.
13
Koren, New Fashion Japan, p.5.
Radu Stern, Against Fashion: Clothing as Art, 1850-1930 (Cambridge, Mass: MIT Press, 2004) p. 118. 14
His equations of them are contradictory to that of my own. I set about unknotting these complex terms and the stigma/honour associated with them. Under certain circumstances, failing, losing, forgetting, unmaking, undoing, unbecoming, not knowing may in fact offer more creative, more cooperative, more surprising ways of being in the world.15 In a well-written and rather poignant article in the Financial Times, the author Janan Ganesh states:
“Our seeming inability to look this fact (failure as a lasting condition) in the eye is not just unbecoming in and of itself, it also inadvertently makes the experience of failure more harrowing than it needs to be.”16
He further discusses why the stigma around failure should be removed, and how honesty about losing is the way to go.
Here, I deal with that concept of imperfection that is spontaneous and not forced. Since wabi-sabi centres around the idea of perfection and diverges to related concepts, most of my research deals with implementing this unique concept onto knitwear. Would people seem happy with this? Would they be comfortable being draped with irregular/ ‘sub-standard’ looking fabric? How does this alter their ideas /change their views on ‘flawless fabric’ (and subsequently, a ‘flawless lifestyle’)?
I will be looking at naturally occurring defects in the knitting process, as well as structures that have been knit to make them look like defects or ripped on purpose. The techniques that have been described here may be applied to garments. Challenging the work of Rei Kawakubo and Maison Martin Margiela, I believe they have purposefully used ‘destruction’ as a part of the design process rather than just allowing the mistakes to occur. I use the primal definition of wabi-sabi to impugn understanding of the same; wherein the depiction of ‘poverty’ or a ‘poor look’ is falsely equated with ‘imperfect beauty’. Semiotics will also be a tool to elevate the element of a maker’s touch, as l study imperfection as a form of language and expression.
It is near impossible to untangle people’s opinions of beauty on their apparel, from all the layering it has collected and stagnated over the years. This dissertation starts tugging at the yarn, but it is only a start. Hopefully, it unravels a fruitful conversation.
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15Judith
9
Halberstam, The Queer Art of Failure (Durham: Duke University Press, 2011), p.2.
Janan Ganesh, ‘Why We Should Be Honest about Failure’, Financial Times, 2019 <https:// www.ft.com/content/432d3482-457b-11e9-b168-96a37d002cd3> [accessed 20 March 2019]. 16
~ Sustainable design involves more creativity and can be far more interesting. Designers need to think about how they build in both readability and emotional attachment - designing products that people want to keep for years and years ~ Tim Cooper17 Waste not, want not. Designers are complicit in the fuelling of growing ‘throw-away culture’, contributing to associated environmental issues, and must begin to 'balance creativity with their environmental responsibilities’. According to Tim Cooper, head of Sheffield Hallam University’s Centre for sustainable consumption - 80 per cent of a product’s environmental impact is fixed at the point of design.18
Figure 2. A screenshot from the movie trailer of ‘The True Cost’ 19
Figure 3. What started it all: Inspired by the movie ‘The True Cost’, this mini-installation depicts waste that can’t be contained in the bag and ends up spilling out, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran20
Hazel Clark and David Eric Brody, eds., Design Studies: A Reader, English ed (Oxford ; New York: Berg, 2009), p.70. 17
18
Ibid.
‘The True Cost’ is a novel documentary film that reveals the dark underbelly of the fashion industry - its social and environmental issues. 19
The ‘waste’ (here) comprises entirely of discarded yarns and swatches found in the Dubied knitting lab at the Royal College of Art, London. These are just a week’s worth of rejected samples! 20
Turning the focus to the second part of my concern : waste in the industry, how can the notion of sustainability (positive) be made relevant to the discipline of 'deformity’ (negative)?
The production of products that have aesthetic and cultural attributes, raise them above the merely functional and help reduce emphasis on consumerism and begin to foster attitudes of responsibility and care.21 Stemming from a deep-rooted sadness over the volume of textile waste created by a single project alone, initial explorations were conducted through direct involvement in the artistic activity of designing itself, i.e mending defected swatches.
Knitting machines in operation can cause the following types of fabric defects :
1. Infringement
2. A series of loops or the formation of enlarged loops
3. Bias hinge series
4. Tying in Jacquard cloth loops of an inappropriate colour
5. Offset of pattern repeats
6. Un-flat ironed creases.
Waste in knitting can also be from breakage, that is, fabric is not fully knitted because of thread breakage or cannot be processed further because of uncorrectable defects.
However since this is secondary, I only touch upon this aspect - industrial mass customisation - in my dissertation, as a small part of research leading to a large scale solution. This is the end goal of my Master’s project, but the themes explored in the dissertation are pivotal to building upto this part of my research. I expand to different sub themes, while reflecting on history and theory of fashion alongside looking at my own work.
It is time. Time to welcome the fragmented. Time to welcome the crushed and the crumbled with open arms. We must learn to embrace the lack of perfection as an advantage in the innovation process or better still, as the end product.
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11
21
Clark and Brody, eds., Design Studies: A Reader, p. 356.
~ Some of the new Japanese fashions seemed absurd. They had rips. They focused attention on body parts that the wearer usually ignored. Fashion became a kind of discipline, a transcendental perspective on the body as the wearer observed it responding to the caresses and restraints of the clothing. This was fashion on a sensitivity scale skewed in the direction of increased awareness and subtlety. At the same time it was fun. ~ Leonard Koren22 History of deconstruction in apparel and the implication of ‘wear-and-tear’ : Many historical priors of deconstructed fashion exist, a case in point the costly silks woven with slits and slashes on purpose. Slashing was deemed one of the strangest fashion occurrences of the sixteenth-century German Renaissance and supposedly started in 1477. They were derived from the clothes of the ‘Landsknecht’ - German mercenary soldiers whose battle-scarred attire brought slashing into fashion during the Renaissance. Seized upon by royal circles who quickly adopted this flashy new style, it was aped by courtiers across Europe, becoming another kind of uniform.23
In the nineteenth and twentieth centuries, the 'degraded’ look in fashion emerged through ragpickers who made their living selling discarded clothing . These people scavenged cloth for recycling, utilising the waste that was created by the frivolity of fashion at its most extreme.24
To adapt an old saying, it was not just what they did, but the way in which they did it that distinguished punk from other subcultural styles.25 I establish connections between the punk movement and wabi-sabi to show that ‘mistakes’ such as:
Rips
Tears
Holes
Loose threads
Unevenness
Raggedness
And other marked departures from conventionality,
were displayed with pride and without regrets. Fashion projects an image, and an image that is created by subcultures is more clear, pronounced and encompasses a whole lifestyle rather than a merely clothes and an outfit.26 It can be argued that the first present-day illustrations of deconstruction in fashion appeared in clothing worn by punks from 1976.
For Dick Hebdige, notable British media theorist and sociologist, the punk’s unique outward appearance created its own definition of an aesthetic taste,27 which was something I had intended to do since the start of this project.
22
Koren, New Fashion Japan, p.1.
Alexander Fury, ‘JOIN THE CLUB’, The Independent, 8 September 2015 in ProQuest <https:// search.proquest.com/docview/1709897453/fulltext/5088EEC1D27D4FF9PQ/1? accountid=28521>[accessed May 17, 2019]. 23
24
Valerie Steele, Japan Fashion Now (New Haven: Yale University Press, 2010), p. 109
Malcolm Barnard, Approaches to Understanding Visual Culture (Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire ; New York: Palgrave, 2001), p.189. 25
Yuniya Kawamura, Fashion-Ology: An Introduction to Fashion Studies, Second edition (New York: Bloomsbury Academic, An imprint of Bloomsbury Publishing Plc, 2018) p.108. 26
27
Kawamura, Fashion-Ology: An Introduction to Fashion Studies, p.105.
There was the spirit of do-it-yourself that was prevalent in the community. They were extremely creative consumers with an immensely strong statement, who could produce and initiate fashion.28 Punks combined production and consumption and broke the barrier between the two stages that used to be separate.29
A lot of garments by Scottish designer Bill Gibb were influenced by the slashed panels in dresses in Flemish paintings.30 Zandra Rhodes, an iconic London Designer, experimented with conventional notions of how a dress should be made. Silk was slashed on purpose to put raw cut edges on display. Rips, tears and holes, uneven hems, and pinking the edges brought a dizzying awareness that indeed the times had changed and with it the cultural standards. This was itself a form of revolution, style though it was - making her one of the punk movement’s ‘official’ designers.31
Rhodes was no anarchist - she was inspired by a non-punk source namely Elsa Schiaparelli’s “Tear” dress from 1938. The dress’s visual potency comes from the fact that this most formal of evening costumes is presented in a ‘deteriorated’ state. Rhodes also designed jersey dresses that were actually torn, also decorated with safety pins.
The Punk movement prized originality, authenticity and individuality, and devised specific visual codes in order to rebel against the cultural mainstream32 and by constructing a language which was relevant and grounded.
The punks appropriated the rhetoric of crisis which had filled the airwaves and translated it into tangible (and visible) terms.33
The various stylistic ensembles adopted by the punks were undoubtedly expressive of genuine aggression, frustration and anxiety. But these statements, no matter how strangely constructed, were cast in a language which was generally available - a language which was current.34
Living in the now and basing my project off of current needs, I want my work to speak the same language,
reflect the present-day situation,
provide a solution and
make a fashionable yet ethical statement.
In the next section, I will look at how Japanese concepts have had an influence on/been influenced by Western design philosophies. How much sense does it make to incorporate a ‘Japanese’ concept35 onto a fabric, that is knitted to be potentially worn by pretty much anyone around the world? And how relevant is this conversation today?
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13
28 29
Kawamura, Fashion-Ology: An Introduction to Fashion Studies, p.108. Kawamura, Fashion-Ology: An Introduction to Fashion Studies, p.106.
Barnard, ed., Fashion Theory: A Reader, Routledge Student Readers (London ; New York: Routledge, 2007), p.102. 30
Carolyn L E. Benesh, ‘ZANDRA RHODES: The art of significant loveliness’. Ornament, 34(3) (2011), 40-45,9, https://search.proquest.com/docview/1013604888/fulltextPDF/ 7858517E3EE34718PQ/1?accountid=28521(accessed 11 May 2019). 31
32
Kawamura, Fashion-Ology: An Introduction to Fashion Studies, p.116.
Dick Hebdige, Subculture: The Meaning of Style, New Accents (London ; New York: Routledge, 1991), p.87. 33
34
Ibid.
I only quote the word ‘Japanese’ because I believe that it is indeed applicable to anything anywhere, unlike popular opinion. It is a stereotype that Japanese designers are frustrated with and speak out openly against. 35
~ It’s boring if things are accomplished too easily, right? When I work I think about the excitement of achievement after hard effort and pain. ~ Rei Kawakubo36 Forging their own path - Rei Kawakubo and Yohji Yamamoto: The ways in which the West categories and understands contemporary Japanese fashion designers and their work presents those designers with a frustrating paradox. It inspires the question: What exactly is “Japanese” about the work of Red Kawakubo and Yohji Yamamoto? The most important element that separates ‘Japanese’ avant-garde fashion from its Western counterpart is its reliance on cloth as a starting point for creation. Yohji Yamamoto stated :
“The biggest difference between our Japanese taste and European people’s taste is in the concept of perfection. When I traveled in Greece and Italy and saw the classical architecture, I saw things that were made in a static image of perfection. I’m not interested in that kind of perfection I’m tired of it. When I make something that I don’t want to recreate my own mind exactly. So I always make seventy to eighty percent of what I think and then I throw it in front of the consumers to complete and say, wear it the way you like.”37
Wabi-sabi in the West has become a catch-all parade that allows some to conveniently label the Japanese approach to aesthetics. Commonly quoted elements of wabi-sabi are: the appreciation of things that show their age, having a character of their own, objects that are imperfect although painstakingly crafted (to reach that imperfection) and impermanence.
Kawakubo remained relentlessly conceptual, and like the punks, whose style she sometimes referenced, she was unafraid to present ‘ugly’ clothes that raised big questions such as “What is beauty?” The dressmaking techniques that gave Kawakubo and Yamamoto the look they desired also finds connection to traditional non-western methods of clothing construction and a modified reinterpretation (I beg to differ, as will be explained in the next section) of the Japanese concept (wabi - sabi) that natural, organic, and imperfect objects can also be beautiful.38
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14
36
Steele, Japan Fashion Now, p. 23
37
Steele, Japan Fashion Now, p. 95
38
Steele, Japan Fashion Now, p. 46
~ I think that pieces that are difficult to wear are very interesting. ~ Rei Kawakubo 39 THE Sweater: The earliest clients of Kawakubo and Yamamoto understood that the two designers were not actually “deconstructing” fashion but carefully “constructing” clothes using specially made textiles and design techniques, as opposed to making very precious objects look worn or used.40 Referring to one of her best-known designs, a black knitted top deliberately woven with holes (see picture), Kawakubo noted:
“The machines that make fabric are more and more making uniform, flawless textures. I like it when something is off - not perfect. Since hand weaving isn’t always possible, we loosen a screw of the machines here and there so they can’t do exactly what they’re supposed to do.”41
Figure 4. The infamous wool sweater, 1982 : Kawakubo thinks of the fabric with “holes” in it as being a kind of lace.42
When the sweater is examined in detail, it looks like an amorphous garment - it is full of holes that position it on the verge of imminent disintegration or collapse and it can be worn in any number of ways. The exploration of tension - literally, as in the tension of the particular stitch and emotionally, conscious of knitting’s property / potential to unravel; seems to serve as the primary function of the sweater. The holes disturb the main property of the sweater i.e containing heat.43
As a knitter myself, this was one of the first images that drew my attention. I was fascinated by how the defects were left on the fabric without being covered up. Holes in knitting imply not only chaos but also order, destruction but also creation, and Kawakubo’s ‘random arrangement’44 of the holes raised their significance immensely. But after learning they were knitted on purpose and not natural holes by themselves, I was surprised and left a little disappointed.
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Marnie Fogg, Why You Can Go Out Dressed Like That: Modern Fashion Explained (Thames & Hudson, 2014), p.174. 39
40
Marnie Fogg, Why You Can Go Out Dressed Like That: Modern Fashion Explained, p.165.
41
Koren, New Fashion Japan, p.117.
42
Ibid
Martin Lambert,, Hilary Alexander, and Provinz Antwerpen, UNRAVEL: Knitwear in Fashion. (Tielt: Lannoo Publishers, 2011), p. 24. 43
Although ‘Random arrangement’ sounds like a paradox, I state this phrase only to point out the metaphor of the holes looking like they were unplanned (random) when they were in fact, positioned to exist as a design element (arrangement). 44
15
~ I love the idea of recuperation. I believe that is beautiful to make new things out of rejected or worn things. ~ Martin Margiela 45 Western ideal of imperfection - Rise of Martin Margiela: By the end of the 1980s, however, the novelty of Kawakubo’s and Yamamoto’s aesthetic began to wane, usurped by new talent from Antwerp, Belgium. The pared down aesthetic dependent on muted colours and ‘poor’ materials, which in the case of Margiela meant recycled fabric, had precedents in fashion from the 1980s and particularly in Japanese designers such as Kawakubo, whose work borrowed from the Zen aesthetic of poverty namely wabi-sabi. The common elements of deconstruction fashion were crystallised as fabric edges left unfinished, seams stitched on the outside of cloth etc.46
Figure 5 and 6. Martin Margiela sample cultures and strains, made for the “9/4/1615” installation at Brooklyn Anchorage, New York, 1999.47
Eighteen dressed dummies represented all previous Martin Margiela collections (Spring/Summer 1989 up to Autumn Winter 1997/8). A collaboration with a prominent Dutch Microbiologist, Dr A.W.S.M van Egeraat, Professor at the Wareningen Agricultural University, The Netherlands. Each outfit was treated with different strains of bacteria, yeast and mould, all isolated from the air and nurtured to provide varying colours and textures.48
These two designers (Kawakubo and Margiela) strike a particular chord with me, as examples. They are case studies that I use as references not to work with, but work away from. They all go against the very principle of naturally-occurring defects. Ironically in the case of Kawakubo, her work is misrepresented as having stemmed from wabi-sabi; reasons being her Japanese descent and some of her garments bearing ‘the look of the poor people’. On the other hand, Margiela derives inspiration from a false sense of the very aesthetic of wabi-sabi. He adds bacteria to break down the garment, rather than allowing the lifespan of the garment to end on its own.
Although I have shed a rather negative light, I would like to credit these two designers for bringing appreciation to the concept of defected/decaying fabric and for having initiated the conversation about rebellion and undesirability, among critics and consumers alike.
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45
Steele, Japan Fashion Now , p.189.
46
Steele, Japan Fashion Now , p. 210.
Kaat Debo, Rebecca Arnold and Sarah Mower, Margiela: The Hermès Years (Lannoo Publishers ,Racine, 2017), p. 34. 47
48
Debo, Arnold and Mower, Margiela: The Hermès Years, p. 45.
16
~ Increasingly fashion and art are getting closer, often wearing clothes means wearing an artwork, wearing the imagination of a designer. I think complex thoughts can be developed and expressed in fashion. Soon fashion will be something to experience like reading books and seeing art are now.” ~ Tadanori Yokoo49
Knitting is an emotion, my emotion. Something that has not been given its due in fashion research, arguably (and ironically) is its most important feature, namely, ‘the aesthetic.’ What intrigues me most about the complicated relationship of fashion with art, is that it makes me question my own style of work. Do I proclaim myself a fashion designer, more specifically a knitwear designer and risk being ostracised by artists? Or does my work fall under the artistic bracket, only to be shunned as ‘old-fashioned’ by designers? If so, how do I tune my project to meet the current (and urgent) needs of the fashion industry, and subsequently the rest of the world?
Many historians argue that industrialisation ushered out the production of craft and prompted our current conception of design.50 Mechanisation of the knitting processes in the late 18th and 19th century resulted in the near extinction of hand-knitting; this in turn saw the rise in the status of the hand-made community, it soared. The main reason that drew an audience for the same, is that the objects made by hand became rarer and more importantly, bore the touch of the maker instead of the machine. In the textile domain, there was a backlash against machine-made products as they were perceived to be inferior to the more luxurious handmade fabrics of previous centuries. The craft product thus not only gained in status through its actual quality but in this time of social mobility, the consumption of someone else’s time became a valuable trading point and a marker of distinction.51
Diana Vreeland defines fashion as “the whim of the public” and as “ornamentation for the human body,” which “involves craftsmanship”.52 Due to knitwear almost always being associated with either being a hobby, as something feminine, a craft or a combination of all three, it is often brushed off that it can be something highly fashionable, experimental and a daring choice for designers.
Speaking of ornamentation, here I attempt to understand if people might be satisfied with adorning themselves with imperfection. Increasingly disposable income levels over recent generations means there is less need to “make do and mend”, as it’s often cheaper and more convenient to buy new than have an item repaired. Busy lifestyles make many people more time-poor than previous generations, and with the loss of sewing and mending skills over time, there is less impetus to repair our garments. The rise of supermarket fashion that can be purchased alongside the weekly shop and the regular occurrence of seasonal sales make clothing seem “disposable” in a way it didn’t used to be.53 Can people be convinced to accept the idea that they do not need perfection in their lives?
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17 49
Koren, New Fashion Japan, p.12.
50
Clark, Hazel, and David Eric Brody, eds., Design Studies: A Reader, p.336.
51
Martin Lambert,, Hilary Alexander, and Provinz Antwerpen, UNRAVEL: Knitwear in Fashion,p.12.
‘Diana.Vreeland-the.Eye.Has.to.Travel’, Vimeo <https://vimeo.com/153660328> [accessed 2 April 2019]. 52
Patsy Perry, ’Read This before You Go Sales Shopping: The Environmental Costs of Fast Fashion’, Read This before You Go Sales Shopping: The Environmental Costs of Fast Fashion, 2017 <https://www.manchester.ac.uk/discover/news/read-this-before-you-go-sales-shopping-the-environmental-costs-of-fast-fashion/> [accessed 7 December 2018]. 53
~ Clothing is so personal and the act of repairing is the smallest gesture loaded with such love” ~ Celia Pym 54
Darning on knitwear - Examining the ‘Wabi-sabi-ness’ of it: What is it about yarn that is so appealing? Within contemporary society, there is a need for sensual experiences that can only be quenched by handle. But we are all so hungry for the visual that tactility has been pushed back. Texture helps one understand the world and knitting is an emotional journey, a voyage of sentimentalities and processes that can be interpreted as a ‘material culture’ process.55 It is a transformation marked not only by object to object, but also of a moving (both literally and figuratively) relationship between maker, making and the made product.
Figure 7. An Ode to the Imperfect: A darning sample by Bridget Harvey, displayed as part of the Open Studio in Sackler Centre, V & A Museum ,London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
We are programmed to gauge the world through touch, our fingers never unmoving: caressing, fiddling, playing. Likewise, the elements of knitting; its tactility, repetition and rhythm have been classified as examples of sensory practices that offer a connectedness between people and things. To dissociate knitting from the domestic and from the restrictions of leisure, craftspeople have started to see its potential for industrial collaboration, as a means of challenging the constraints of materials, forms and uses.
The renewal of the ever-quickening pace of fast fashion, has stirred consumers out of the bubble of ignorance they were trapped in. Due to the alarming rate at which clothes are bought impulsively and discarded, we are now aware of the consequences as we see them in front of our own eyes. This has lead to make-do-and-mend techniques and is one of the main reasons for mending to make a comeback in the last decade. Mending is a means of expression and personal creative choice.
54
Jo Hall, 'Hole Hearted’, Embroidery The Textile Art Magazine, 13 (2018):12.
Why do I say this? I state this term from an unabashedly biased view point: As a knitter, I feel knitting is an underrated tool that depicts the relationship between people and their belongings. 55
Darning is philosophically in opposition to fast fashion, in regards to the part where apparel is discarded due to tiny defects. In his interview for Embroidery magazine Tom Van Deijnen, an entirely self-taught textile maker states:
“I learnt how to knit socks with a lot of blood, sweat and tears, and then they got holes in them, so I thought I needed to learn how to do the repairing, which I did.”56
Tom is interested in the darning process as much as if not more than, the completed garment, and he undertakes thorough research into technique and pattern.57
Like Tom Van, Celia Pym and Bridget Harvey are two other textile designers who serve as my muse; not so much for their techniques, but for their ideologies and their empathy for fellow people who are either knitters already or who are keen to learn. Their understanding of fabric surfaces and their approach towards mending workshops are inspiring.
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19
56
Hattie Gordon, ‘Profound acts of repair', Embroidery The Textile Art Magazine, 7 (2017): 36.
57
Gordon, ‘Profound acts of repair', 7 (2017): 37.
~ An article of clothing may seem to be ‘meaningless’ in itself; so we must then, more than ever, get at its social and global function, and above all at its history; because the manner in which vestimentary values are presented (forms, colours, tailoring, etc.) can very well depend on an internal history of the system. ~ Roland Barthes58
Examination of a knitted swatch using ‘The Fashion System’:
Object study: In terms of micro research, I present my own swatch as an example. I shall apply description and speculation to study the material object (knitted swatch).
Given below is an excerpt from a book that explains visual culture:
First, understanding a painting, picture or diagram requires that the interpreter understand the convention that marks, lines and shapes on a two-dimensional ground represent something in the world. An interpreter has to know that an image has been made with the purpose of representing something.59
I take on the task of presenting blunder as an exterior on fabric (three-dimensional). As a spokesperson for failure, displaying this means treading the fine line between right and wrong. In the words of Roland Barthes, a prominent French literary theorist, philosopher, critic, and semiotician:
“Fashion60 and literature61 in fact utilise a common technique whose end is seemingly to transform an object into language: it is description.”62
The broken, ripped and disfigured shift the entire meaning of the fabric from commonplace to the bona fide, they raise it to the distinctiveness of the never-before-seen. I leave my fabric open to interpretation with the hope that it conveys the right message. Which elicits the question, what do my defects actually denote and connote? And what does the overall swatch denote and connote? Denotation (perceptual message) is the kind of meaning understood when shapes, lines, colours and textures are understood as representing things in the world. It is the kind of meaning that is understood when the answers to the questions,’What is that?’, or ‘What is that a picture of?’ are understood. Denotation is often explained as the ‘literal’ meaning of an image.63
Connotation (cultural message) is slightly more complex. It is often explained as the thoughts, feelings and associations that accompany one’s perception of an example of visual culture. It is the feelings that a photograph makes one feel, the associations that a piece of design has, or the thoughts that come into one’s head whenever one sees a particular typeface.64
Roland Barthes and Andy Stafford, The Language of Fashion, English ed (Oxford ; New York: Berg, 2006), p.12. 58
Barnard, Malcolm, Approaches to Understanding Visual Culture (Houndmills, Basingstoke, Hampshire ; New York: Palgrave, 2001), p.43. 59
60
Fashion = (here) knitted swatches
61
Literature = (here) this dissertation
Roland Barthes, Matthew Ward, and Richard Howard, The Fashion System, Vintage Classics Philosophy (London: Vintage, 2010), p. 12. 62
63
Barnard, Approaches to Understanding Visual Culture, p.149.
64
Ibid
Denotation and connotation are crucial concepts in semiotics and are two elements that could prove useful to my understanding of what the knitted snags imply - in themselves and as a part of the overall fabric.
The defects denote (what they actually are):
Rips /tears /mistakes /gape /absence of fabric where it should have been/a void.
They simultaneously connote :
Hurry /confusion /frustration /imperfection /improper knowledge of knitting /a kind of ‘stain’ on the entire textile.
Due to the defect(s), the fabric seems unusable and undesirable. If I were a non-designer, I would view it as a thing of ‘high fashion’ or just plain brazenness. I might see it as an object of ‘fun’ and not something to be taken seriously.65
Here the knitted faults on the fabric act as ‘signifiers’66 of the ‘signified’67 - imperfection/disposable (implies the representative function of the garment that makes it a total social object). I use elements from the book ‘The Language of Fashion’ by Barthes to support my analysis of the knit swatches. The utterance of the signifier is thus something completely other than a compilation of noteworthy traits : it is the actual birth, patient and delicate, of a signification.68
Figure 8. Absence: The omission of elements can play a role which is meaningful, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
I try to decode the meaning of a hole (in fabric) - what did it mean then and what does it mean now? Could they be interrelated? The vestimentary sign can be expressed as the degree zero, it is never null.69 Similarly holes, drop needle70 and other defects signify something missing. On examination of the swatch, we see a vacuum in between the hole where stitches should be; missing stitches in a row where it should have been knit right etc. I highlight these ‘lost' elements by mending around them, placing into spotlight this ‘degree zero’. These visualisations of failure can play a powerful role by providing a showcase for the importance of self-acceptance - a significant statement to others and more importantly, to oneself.
To reiterate, these are solely my opinions. Having seen the processes behind the final fabric and worked with knitted fabrics for a few years now, I base my convictions off the experiences I have had. 65
According to the book ‘The Language of Fashion’, a dress is a signifier of a main implied idea or message 66
In tandem with the above explanation, ‘the signified’ represents the degree of participation and the value of the system that is meaningful. 67
68 69
Barthes, Roland, Matthew Ward, and Richard Howard, The Fashion System, p. 86. Barthes and Stafford, The Language of Fashion, p. 29.
During knitting, one or some needles can be adjusted to ‘drop’ the stitch i.e. those needles will be dis-engaged to stitch and then engaged again right after skipping the stitch. 70
Figure 9. Right that wrong: A sample of my own work, a knit swatch with four types of defects (from left to right) ladders, grease stain, drop needle and loose loops at the end due to improper needle take-up ,London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
Figure 10. Set right: A continuum with the above image (Figure 10.), where mending has been done around the defect so as to: a. Highlight the imperfection b. Prevent the stitches from dropping to increase durability of the fabric ,London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
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~ The world is indeed full of ugly jumpers, but it is also full of wonderful, innovative, frightening and challenging knitted objects. ~ Joanne Turney71
Making a-mend-s: How is my work different from that of Celia’s or Bridget’s? Although I do follow the same school of thought - using repair as a medium of self-expression and also waste prevention - unlike darning which conceals the area under stress, I emphasise the flaw by giving it a border i.e. mending only the loops that have fallen, just enough to make the stitches robust and to show the characteristics of the defect. I give the defect a new dimension - each has its own individuality, its own uniqueness.
Earlier, garments were slashed intentionally to either depict class differences or in a show of rebellion against the natural order. It was clear people who made or wore such fabrics wanted to make a bold statement. Gaping slashes portrayed a kind of novel regularity that enraptured viewers via their shock value - these portrayed conservative skepticism, minority group misidentification, counterculture insult etc.. Although it is not the first time that aesthetics of imperfection intersect with ideas about fashionability, my approach to this notion and the means to represent it can be considered a new method.
Figure 11. Black hole: Staring bleakly back at you, London, 2019. Photography: Shipra Chandran.
The hole right in the centre of the swatch serves as an uncomfortable reminder of how accustomed to ‘finished’ products we are. The subsequent mending was done around the hole, as a part of my personal project. The needles on the fabric are latched onto the loose loops, so as to prevent them from coming undone.
Now defects are somewhat accepted but with a twist: they are required to be mended (over it) to cover the hole. The darned patches are also a fashion statement, but they are more focused on making people aware about sustainability. In this field, our creations should express a logical structure that clearly shows both the goal and the means used in their fabrication.72 What I expect from the visualisation of mending is honesty in bringing out how fabric and in turn a dress, is made; I would like to expand this approach as much as possible.
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71 72
Joanne Turney, The Culture of Knitting (New York: Berg, 2009), p.221. Stern, Against Fashion: Clothing as Art, p. 131
~ Push their flaws, make it the most beautiful thing about them. ~ Diana Vreeland 73
‘Snags’ in the analysis: Some of the study has been based off the book ‘The Fashion System’, that clearly states the ideologies used are for ‘written’ and ‘image’ clothing.74 Therefore the accuracy of superimposing this conjecture with my work is questionable. I have tried to make the theory relatable and current, to keep up with the times since it could have intriguing implications. There is a new possibility that the theory works with the actual fabric itself, without being limited to a two-dimensional view of it via magazines.
I plan to conduct focus groups after, since this paper has helped steer my research towards that direction. While writing this dissertation has come at the right time - it helped me navigate through my findings and strike the right balance between academic research and studio work - I put a lot of thought into whether I should have lead the focus groups for the dissertation itself. I then decided against it due to time constraints and the focus on the theories behind my project. In all likelihood, the process of the focus groups and its findings might have helped make this paper ,specifically the analysis more concrete.
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‘Diana.Vreeland-the.Eye.Has.to.Travel’, Vimeo <https://vimeo.com/153660328> [accessed 2 April 2019]. 73
74
Simply put, the terms refer to photographs of garments and their descriptions, in magazines.
~ If a creator starts his or her own unique way of expression, and if he or she is really good and original, he or she is involved in a constant fight against society ~ Kazuko Koike 75
Casting off! Undoubtedly, writing this dissertation has elevated my line of thought in the field of textile design. To the best of my abilities, I have delineated my thoughts, trials and tribulations that could propel my studio work and prove useful to society in the end. As I proceed with the research done for this paper, I hypothesise that experimental psychology would play a role in the design development of ‘deficient’ knitted fabric.76
To get a ‘tactile idea’ on how or what people interpret the concept of wabi-sabi as, I will knit fabric swatches with defects (on purpose). After which I will conduct focus groups of knitters and nonknitters questioning them about their idea of imperfection, and then ask them to mend the swatches in their own ways with any materials available to them. With knitted outcomes as mediums, I will ask knitters and non-knitters to take control over the hands-on design process.
An introduction will be given to the non-knitters to provide them with a general idea about the knitting process. The idea being :
- How knitters and non-knitters react to defects in the fabric.
- The ways they mend the defects/change them or
- If they want the defects to be covered up at all (and if not, question their choice to understand more on how/why they are able to embrace the concept of imperfection)
To me, a knitted garment’s surface is a ground for feelings, thoughts and sentiments. I want to make clothes that reflect the realities of an often unhappy(?) world chasing after immaculateness. Knitting chooses to be silently disruptive and it is the perfect medium for me to express my thoughts - opinionated apparel. Unlike darning where the defects in the fabric are completely covered; using the concept of wabi-sabi, I work around them. It serves as a metaphor for a way of being; the main message I wish to communicate with this dissertation and my work here at the Royal College of Art namely - working your way around imperfection and finding peace with it.
I view the faults as human beings,
We are not perfect; we stumble along the way,
We are erroneous
Torn
Broken
Dropped
But in the end with a little repairing around the edges, we are alright.
I leave you with this quote from Yamamoto:
"I think perfection is ugly. Somewhere in the things humans make, I want to see the scars, failure, disorder, distortion. If I can feel those things in work by others, then I like them. Perfection is a kind of order, like overall harmony, and so on. These are things someone forces onto something. A free human doesn’t desire such things.”77
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75
Koren, New Fashion Japan, p.15.
Experimental psychologists employ human participants to study many topics, including sensation & perception, memory, cognition, learning, motivation, emotion; developmental processes and social psychology. 76
77
Koren, New Fashion Japan, p.7.
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