WHAT'S THE STORY
The Future – Who?
JULIA KOERNER
“FASHION IS THE SMALLEST SCALE OF ARCHITECTURE.”
Her designs went further than the runways of Paris Fashion Week: Julia Koerner’s 3D printed dresses are frequent guests in international museums, and her headdress and shoulder piece helped costume designer Ruth Carter win an Oscar for “Black Panther”. Koerner was not trained as a fashion designer, however; she’s an Austrian architect whose obsession with 3D printing paved the way into the heart of her first love, fashion. Interview: Petrina Engelke. Photos: Pia Clodi
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rs. Koerner, how can architecture enhance fashion? When I started to collaborate with fashion designers like Iris van Herpen, I brought a skillset which other people in the fashion industry didn’t and don’t have. For me, fashion is the smallest scale of architecture, because by the way we dress, we create an immediate space around our body. I was able to add my design skills in this three-dimensional space to extend other designers’ ideas. I mostly engage in the very progressive haute couture field, where brands are innovating and testing new materials, new stitching methods, and new techniques to create textiles, implementing new technologies as well. You are using parametric design, a process from architecture that has the potential to revolutionize fashion production. Can you explain it a little bit? In parametric design, you use a software which allows you to either write or visually script a code in which you can very easily change parameters. If you apply this to your 3D design and change the parameters, the form will automatically adapt to different sizes, proportions, colors, and so forth, you essentially have control over variation. For example, you can take the measurements of a body scan and then adapt your design to fit perfectly. Or you can use it for mass personalization and customization.
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style in progress
