3 Fashion Week Berlin Daily

Transcription

1 Issue 3 Fashion Week Berlin Daily NICOLAS KANTOR & STEPHAN left: T-Shirt by Adidas SLVR blouson, cape, belt and leather bags by Silent / pants by Y3 shoes by Dr. Martens right: coat by Damir Doma 6 WOLFEN a chat with Jacqueline Huste 7 NIcole urbschat has a fetish for jewellery 14 BEN BRUNNEMER an interview with NY s fashion week DJ the silentium IUE Lectures and Writings by John Cage

2 PAGE 3 / the SILENTIUM issue MODERN GRACE GREY THE GEOMETRY OF BEAUTY. Slip into a Zen meditation mode and compose yourself with DERZEIT s Silentium issue silence is the best condition to enjoy a newspaper. Tune out the sound and let the snow-covered landscape on the cover help you to switch off the buzzing noise of the city. The horses, by the way, were the true professionals and had an inner calm: not even the model s eerie styling made them scatter. For further advice on how to shield yourself from the world, soak in the seclusion strategies of Sharon Welzel, listen to the silent voice of Jacqueline Huste, and take a moment to contemplate the latest runway trends. Or tune in after all: Ben Brunnemer, NY s fashion week DJ dilates on the sound of fashion. Luca Gajdus CONTRIBUTORS IUE 3 She is Hamburg s gift to the fashion world. Her years of modelling experience have also proved a gift to DER- ZEIT. Let s put it this way: While we shot Luca s portrait, her baby-son was munching biscuits between her feet. Would you have guessed? Silentium Sharon Welzel She is part of our current catwalk review team, this issue s essayist and DERZEIT s fashion shoot clip cutter and thus could be called an intellectual multitasker. But once you get to know her you ll quickly realize she s not the bespectacled kind, but the funny one; she by the way asked us to add something with wiggle her ears. We re sure she knows how to do that. Being restless is probably part of Nicole Urbschat s character: Working for a big publishing house in Hamburg and newly appointed Co- Editor-in-Chief of Quality, one of Berlin s high-end fashion publications, she travels between the two cities and fashion hubs across Europe. For Derzeit, she revealed her fetish for jewellery. Nicole Urbschat DERZEIT Imprint Collection MODERN GRACE GREY Villeroy&Boch Premium Bone Porcelain tableware stands for excellent quality and distinctive design. Gentle curves combine with geometric forms to create a feeling of timeless elegance. The Modern Grace Grey pattern easily sets tasteful accents in combination with the white tones of Modern Grace. managing editor & graphic design ALICE KUHN fashion director Sebastiano Ragusa senior editors SONJA STÖSSEL Nina Trippel event SVEN HAUSHERR MICHAEL müller copy editor Colin McKenna Elizabeth Rushe printed by Berliner Zeitungsdruck art director / fonts MANUEL SCHIBLI editors alexandra kruse Anne postrach design Dominik bachmann Jessica Barthel daily photography Volker eichenhofer FAMMIVEDERE Kay strasser contributors: Joachim Bessing, Jacco Bos,Cecilia Bourgueil, Lena Emery, Amos Fricke, Nicolas Kantor, Reinhard Keck, Martina Kix, Cathy Lara, Jonas Lindström, Michael Mann, Stefan Milev, Joachim Müller Ruchholtz, Florian Glaessel, Claudia Schibli, Annina Luzie Schmid, Tom Strohmetz, Nicole Urbschat, Christoph Varga, Philipp Verheyen, Sharon Welzel, Thore Wetzel, Marcus Woeller DERZEIT is published by Alice Kuhn & Manuel Schibli

3 PAGE 4 / the SILENTIUM issue PAGE 5 / the SILENTIUM issue Like one of his gothic creations, Tim Burton s joie de vivre is that he is exceptional; representing the difference that makes you wonder and grimace. Nobody has any doubt that Burton s fascination lies within the depths of a childlike and devious mind. The proof is in the pudding at Arsenal Cinema, where the director s unique work is celebrated with his most acclaimed films on screen. Burton and his wife and business partner Helena Bonham Carter hold the worldwide torch for Goths and Emos that envelope them in velvet gloves, a pair of dirty boots and a huge amount of tangled hair. But even for those lacking any resemblance to Edward Scissorhands, getting an insight to Burton s odd world is always a gripping experience. RK wizard of Odd Tim Burton Screening January 14th - February 10th 2011 / Kino Arsenal / Potsdamer Str. 2 / Berlin-Mitte back stage by FAMMIVEDERE.COM Calling your collection Cult is one thing but Potipoti really means it: The knitwear-focused brand has once more dipped deep into the jungle of tribal patterns. After all, that s what they do best. Tonight Potipoti will present their new collection. To celebrate the event, 200 tote gift bags will be handed out and cocktails served. Enter the jungle and a drink to that! NT Knitted bits & Spanish Sips January 21st / from 19 to h, Potipoti Shop / Rosenthaler Str finally fashion Cares Overproduction is not only an issue for butter and tomatoes, but also for Marlenetrousers and glitter capes. Why not sell donated heaps of unsold designer- and lifestylecollections on Ebay? In cooperation with betterplace.org, Premium-bosses Anita and Norbert Tillmann have created the project Fashion cares. All the revenue goes to the non-profit-organisation Straßenkinder. Nice. SW Fashion Cares by Premium & betterplace.org Pattern party Rave habitus This year s Context dance festival at HAU is all about bad habits. Anyone who expects an overload of bad behaviour, a line of nail-chewing, over-opinionated dancers standing on the wrong side of the escalator, is however wrong. Based on Bourdieu s understanding of habitus (a reminder: One is not aware of one s own habitus and can High definition Over the past 60 years, Finnish brand Marimekko, best known for its patterns, has perfected the textile cure for dreary winter days in the high north. The label captures the lack of light and missing color on fabric and arranges them all over the house. Fashion expert and parttime installation artist Julia Freitag reveals what other things you can do with these colourful yard goods... AP Marimekkos 60th anniversary celebration with stylist Julia Freitag, January 21st / From h / Alte Schönhauser Str. 42 / preview FRIDAY The word body art makes the human brain work on high voltage it spits out images of tattoos, piercings, maybe even of bodybuilders or plastic surgery. You d never associate the term with fine art if anything, maybe with Italian sculptures but to be honest, rather with contortionists. The name a trendy city dweller should really think of is Robert Mapplethorpe. Ah, right! some will think and slap their forehead. This guy who is often celebrated as one of the greatest photographers of the only influence it by the means of self-reflection), we see multiple interpretations of the topic: The company Schwalbe from Amsterdam raves nonstop to a monotonous techno beat. Emanuel Gat Dance and his Silent Ballet on the other hand show a piece with eight dancers, but without music. As we all know, there is an abundance of variations in-between loud and silent and these nuances make the festival worth a visit because wanting to attend cultural events but never going is a bad habit. SW Schlechte Angewohnheiten Context #8 / dance festival January 21st 29th / Hebbel am Ufer / Stresemannstr th century, who journalists have called extreme and tacit : He knew how to turn bodies into art. That s right. Yes, that is right, dear art lovers; and of THIS Robert Mapplethorpe, 187 works have made their way into the Berlin name-dropping-gallery C/O and are waiting to challenge your definition of body art until March 27. AP Robert Mapplethorpe opening / January 21st / Doors at 19h / C/O gallery Oranienburger Str. 35/36 / Word is by Alexandra Kruse There are days when I simply feel like couture. Perhaps it s my sign (Cancer), the full moon or the full moon in Cancer, which we currently have, with its magic that makes sure that everything is a bit more beautiful than it really is. Although, it s definitely not the right time to make important decisions. For good reason, because you feel like you got stoned for breakfast. So I really shouldn t have bought the magnificent, tulle-veil lambskin clutch from Maison Martin Margiela??? There s no point in arguing (the right bag DOES INDEED say everything. I also stopped talking to people who carry tote bags. That s so last season.) At any rate, Dawid Tomaszewski already presented his cocktail dresses before lunch and you really wanted to put one on right away. For comfort s sake, my day couture was a cashmere suit that looked pajama-like, but was in fact by Bottega Venetta. Instead, I «hid» in the Mercedes-Benz lounge to avoid about 3,000 photographers, camera teams and self-made bloggers, who without asking took shots of everything that moved. When it comes down to it, you don t want to end up on the evening news just because you are standing next to Barbara Schöneberger, who just happened to join «the good girls club». Because she is so grandiose. She s not the only one. «The good girls club» met in this very lounge, enjoyed some bubbly and joyfully munched on appetizers. Karolina Kurkowa sat next to me on the sofa wearing top-model gear (Azzedine Alaia, of course), happily gave interviews and even answered the stupidest questions («What are you wearing?») with tremendous patience and a super bright smile. Then a miracle took place. My Pomellato ring in blue topaz met its lost twin, a topaz in bright white. The two became friends immediately. The woman wearing the ring and I also became friends immediately. It was destiny. She is already planning my wedding a cherry blossom festival. The guests will travel by boat to the event and will be moved to the point of tears. I am in total agreement with this plan (I already know what I m going to wear, the silk winter dream by Perret Schaad). After all, it s a full moon so I can wish for something.

4 PAGE 6 / the SILENTIUM issue PAGE 7 / the SILENTIUM issue Wolfen zooming in on Jacqueline Huste doesn t take part in Fashion Week unlike other designers. Neither does the studied architect launch her designs in collections but sells them exclusively in her own shop. Despite all this, Wolfen her label, called after her home town has become an steady part of the German fashion scene during the last eleven years. by N ina Trippel Do you follow rituals when designing? I m good at it when driving. That s difficult, obviously, but locking myself up in my studio doesn t work at all. Therefore I prefer to drive around in the car... or to lie down and act as if I was sleeping. Then the ideas come by themselves. You don t create collections in the classic sense... No, I stopped calling them collections a long time ago. There are items that I keep in store no matter whether it s summer or winter, and there are others that only change color or fabric. Apparel is the word that you use most frequently... In my opinion, fashion is something very different. I was once photo by Alice Kuhn told that I wasn t allowed to use the word fashion for my designs and I really don t use it myself. To me, it s apparel. Fashion stands in a different context. Fashion is supposed to change something, but I don t work under this pretense. Where do you produce your designs? Everything is produced in Germany, parts of it in Berlin. We don t sew in Berlin though, it s only knitting; the hand knitting is done in Wolfen, we sew in Southern Germany. At the moment, your clothes are only available in your shop?! Yes, and there are private orders. In March I will also launch my online-shop. Which mood influences your designs? A certain privacy. I don t like it when clothes look too hectic and patterns that I don t understand at first sight are not an option. They have to be like a room: Once you enter it, you know what it looks like. My customers often say that they don t feel dressed up in my clothes, that they feel protected. I think they are quite tacit. What does your clothing feel like? It s always made of natural fibers. I never use synthetic materials. Also, I m not the glamorous type. I like matt, blunt surfaces. Every once in a while there s also an intense color, but generally, the colors are rather sober fractured, as I prefer to call them. What s your favorite piece that you ever designed? I love a lot of them. It is rather the other way around: There are one or two pieces that I don t like in retrospective. At the moment I m also working detail shot of a cardigan in Wolfen s signature knitting on a dress which I designed three years ago. What does that dress look like? Back then it was part of the Frankie - collection. It is very plain, with a truncated skirt and a V-neck. It is very girlish, like from a 1940 s countryside.» I always have a plan B. After plan B there s a plan C.«If this dress was a still life, how would you arrange it? I would add a little dust, dry earth. It has to have something light, yet earthy, a dress that you would wear for a summer trip to the lake, for a picnic, a dress in which you frolic over the grass and also wear out at night. If you were turned into a piece of clothing, which one would you be? Probably a cardigan. One made from the wool of a Pomeranian country sheep. And who would wear you? A girl like Frankie, the protagonist in Carson McCuller s novel. Do you have a plan B or is this your plan B as you studied architecture? I always have a plan B. After plan B there s a plan C. I m not 100 percent sure whether my current occupation is what I want to do for the rest of my life, that thought almost makes me a little sad. I can well imagine getting rid of all this. What the future may bring, I can t tell yet, but I can always think of something very different. ~ Poetry to pin on fetish Some thoughts on jewellery Nicole Urbschat In a world that was unable to clearly distinguish between men and women, up and down, celebrity and nothing, even jewellery was an ambiguous matter: the bigger the gem, the more convincing proof of everlasting love. With ostentation, a man revealed a woman s worth. The most famous example: the Taylor-Burton diamond, worth about 2.5 million Euros and purchased by Richard Burton as a pledge of his love for Elizabeth Taylor in Those 69 carat of shining attention made the glamorous couple even more enviable and revealed a truth not only valid for bejewelled divas: Jewellery is a way of theatrically staging one s appearance. Just like the spoiler of a well-looked-after Golf GTI. The shining gem adds intensity to a personality. So to speak, a personality becomes more if it is apparelled, the cultural sociologist Georg Simmel wrote about the fascination of the bling-bling in And who doesn t want to be more? In this sense, jewellery has never been luxury for me, but an essential way of showing myself in a better light. That ethos hasn t changed until today. Especially in times when fashion changes within a day and brands mutate into fetishes, jewellery seems like a classic, consistent object from a different time. After all, it s hard to tell whether a diamond is from Cartier or Tiffany it simply gleams. For a long while now, the appeal of modern jewellery has lain less in conventional pomp and a fetish of price. Instead, it expresses personality, individuality and unconventionality. What used to represent status now stands for style. Damn it, today we buy jewellery on our own and wear it every day. Its worth is no longer measured by scales but in originality and meaning. Someone who can buy everything, really just goes for what is special and exclusive. Only a person that is able to overstep the conventional boundaries of luxury will be able to redefine values. This is what jewellery designer Denise Julia Reytan does and she even takes it a step further. Reytan s colliers and brooches embody decorative equality not only for its bearer. In her collage-like, threedimensional objects, transformed bling-jewellery meets pure gems, shapely left-overs of industrial packaging are combined with elements of religious amulets. The designer consequently abolishes traditional boundaries of jewellery design. She calls it democratic jewellery or unconditional beauty and thus creates an anything goes -mentality. She creates headstrong, extremely poetic jewellery. It is a motley treasure box filled during forays through her city, a big playground, where objects meet spontaneously and, with the help of silicon casts, are joined to other new objects at Reytan s desk in Neukölln everything becomes one, a snapshot of our time. Poems on the body, Reytan calls her work, jewellery like fragments of modern culture - candy-colored and pop-plasticfantastic, amusing and romantic at the same time. Who needs diamonds after that? If I had the choice, I d prefer to melt into one of these poetic ornaments, because her jewellery doesn t remind me of a past love, but of times when dressing up still had a playful touch. Crazy Angel by JOACHIM MULLER RUCHHOLTZ Pineda de Mar, 2008

5 PAGE 8 / the SILENTIUM issue PAGE 9 / the SILENTIUM issue above T-shirt, shirt, jacket, pants, belt & shoes by Boris Bidjan Saberi the horse carries two bags by Silent below T-shirt by Adidas SLVR vest by Butterfly Soulfire jacket by Y3 / pants and belt by Silent SILENTIUMIUE NICOLAS KANTOR &STEPHAN tank shirt and shirt by Songzio

6 polaroid films sponsored by the impossible project production kindly supported by Delight Rental Berlin NICOLAS KANTOR sebastiano ragusa TOM STROHMETZ Jacco Bos T-shirt by Romain Kremer iue / jacket by photography styling hair & make-up styling assistance Julius SILENTIUM pants by Juun.J 3 knee socks by Falke MANUEL SCHIBLI STEPHAN ALICE KUHN shoes and fanny pack by Prada art direction model / at Mega Models backstage photography

7 PAGE 10 / the SILENTIUM issue PAGE 11 / the SILENTIUM issue FRI Please note: All fashion shows and trade shows by accreditation/invite/rsvp only! Some showrooms and fashion events are open to the public! Please check individually! Catwalk SHOWS DAY DAY & NIGHT Berlin Bebelplatz and offsite shows Events, parties, concerts and more Anja Gockel 10h Tent, Bebelplatz Schacky and jones Presentation 10.30h Hotel de Rome Blacky Dress 11.30h Tent, Bebelplatz Michael Sontag 12h Römischer Hof Kilian Kerner 13h Tent, Bebelplatz Green 16h Hotel Adlon Parsival Cserer 16.30h Tent, Bebelplatz Kaviar Gauche 18h Tent, Bebelplatz Fashion! lecture Photography by Camilla Åkrans, 12h Fellshus of the Nordic Rauchstr Berlin-Mitte G-Shock Lounge Presentation, 14h CLV II Store Meinekestr Berlin-Charlottenburg Fa s h i o n Blogger Meeting, 15h Mein Haus am See Brunnenstr. 197 Potipoti Cult Shop &,19h Rosenthalerstr. 66 Robert Mapplethorpe Opening, 19h C/O Gallery Oranienburger Str.35 Edged Opening Party, 19h Torstr. 161 The Sounds White Music Night Concert, 20h Postbahnhof Straße der Pariser Kommune Berlin-Friedrichshain Schlechte Angewohnheiten Dance Festival, 20h Hebbel am Ufer Hallesches Ufer 32 Uslu Airlines vs. I l l u s i o n institute Party, 21h Bar Tausend Schiffbauerdamm 11 Beetlejuice Tim Burton screening, 21.15h Arsenal Kino Potsdamer Str Berlin-Mitte Karaoke Bright, 22h Torstr. 116 Kaska Hass Presentation, 23h Umspannwerk Paul-Lincke Ufer Berlin-Kreuzberg ESther perbandt 18h Nhow Hotel Michalsky 20h Tempodrom not to be missed choice of the day by the Derzeit team Camilla Norrback Ida SJÖstedt Diana Orving Foreign affairs: a Scandinavian trio in Berlin L U C A photography STEFAN MILEV, art direction MANUEL SCHIBLI, styling SEBASTIANO RAGUSA, model LUCA GAjdUS at Iconic, hair LISA Zeitler, make-up TOM STROHMETZ, photography assistance DUNJA ANTIC, backstage DOMINIK BACHMANN Luca lives in Berlin. She says that in contrast to other cities, you don t adapt yourself to Berlin: the city adapts itself to you, in the sense that every person adds something to it. Luca wears a dress and jacket by manish Arora

8 PAGE 13 / the SILENTIUM issue OnGoing They always come Bag. Adidas SLVR at Premium / h Luckenwalderstr. 4 6 Barre Noire / h Berlin Fashion Network Rosenthaler Str Berlin-Mitte Barocco code Esmod / h Atrium der Deutschen Bank Unter den Linden C.Neeon / h Kastanienallee 55 Collect showroom Contemporary Fashion / h L40 Linienstr. 40 ECO Ecological Fashion, Cosmetics & Food / h Almstadtstr. 35 Edged Avant - garde to High Fashion / h Torstr Berlin-Mitte Green Ecological Design / h Hotel Adlon Unter den Linden 77 Nanai showroom at Premium / h Luckenwalderstr. 4-6 Days Berlin allover the city ProjeKt Galerie Contemporary Fashion Fair & Presentations / h Glasshouse at HBC Karl-Liebknecht-Str Berlin-Mitte Trikoton A/W 2011/12 /Presentation / h SYSTM Gallery Torstr. 68 Daytime But&Better Counter Event to B&B / h Tempelhofer Damm Berlin-Tempelhof C o ry Arcangel daily / h Hamburger Bahnhof Invalidenstr Berlin-Mitte Camilla Åkrans Fashion Photography daily / h Gallery Swedish Photography Oranienburger Str.27 Enrico David Mon - Sat / 11-18h Veneklasen Werner Gallery Rudi-Dutschke-Str Berlin-Mitte Monika Goetz Tue - Sat / h Georg-Kolbe-Museum Sensburger Allee Berlin John Kleckner & Patrick Tuttofuoco Tue - Sat / h by appointment only Peres Projects Große Hamburger Str Berlin-Mitte A Different I c o n James Dean daily / h Pariser Platz 4a Magma Group Veronica Brovall, Emil Holmer, Jyrki Riekki and more / h Autocenter Eldenaerstr Berlin-Friedrichshain Robert Mapple - thorpe Retrospective daily / h C/O Oranienburger Str Swedish Fa s h i o n Films Swedish Fashion Goes Berlin daily / h Gallery Swedish Photography Oranienburger Str. 27 J u e r g e n teller Paradise Tue - Sat / 10-18h Pariser Platz 4a Trade show bright / h Normannenstr Berlin-Friedrichshain Premium / h Station Berlin Luckenwalder Str. 4 Premium M e n / h Station Berlin Luckenwalder Str. 4 seek at premium / h Station Berlin Luckenwalder Str. 4 Thekey.to / h Columbiahalle Columbiadamm Berlin-Tempelhof BREE The Bag. Sincerely Yours. TWELVE calendar available at VOO store!!!

9 PAGE 14 / the SILENTIUM issue PAGE 15 / the SILENTIUM issue TUNING UP THE CATWALK by NINA TRIPPEL derzeit vs ben brunnemer The lights go off, the first model appears on the catwalk. But wait a second something is missing: The lights go off again, the music starts and now the show can really begin, the models step onto the catwalk after the first promising rhythmic beats have faded away. Music is essential to every fashion show. Like a film, it lures the audience in and centers their attention. Lyrics and presentation are woven into a story, telling a textile tale. Could you imagine a show without music? Theoretically interesting in real life, it s only annoying. Vibrating mobile phones, breathing, whispering and rustling distract from the essential; the high tension, the concentration at the beginning of a show could scarcely be achieved without musical input. Ben Brunnemer is one of the DJs who mix the beat to the catwalk shows and he is one of the most frequently booked DJs for New York Fashion Week. His choice in music has established a trend away from the drumming beats of mainstream shows. Designers like Threeasfour, A Detacher, Thom Browne or Behnaz Sarafpour book him on a regular basis. Twice a year, his diary is all red: February and September is fashion week time at the Big Apple. DERZEIT met Ben in his apartment in the Alphabet City. How did you become a DJ for fashion shows? It started with Threeasfour (As Four back then). It was their first show at the Bryant Park tent in Their press agent at that time saw what I was doing and booked me to do a bunch of shows for other designers that she represented. From there it snowballed. By now I ve done Behnaz Sarafpour nine or ten seasons. How does the working with designers function? Honestly, everyone is different. Some designers have a theme and their show has a very specific idea and the music is supposed to complete it. For example, when I work with A Détacher, even if Mona Kowalska doesn t know all the songs, she has a real vision and knows the feeling she is looking for. I ll find the songs that fit the mood. Others have a song they really want to use for the collection because they ve been listening to it while working on the collection. I sort of fill in around that. Is any kind of music doable? I think so. Most people think show music has to be upbeat house music, it mustn t be boring. It has to be quick......to match the walking? It is this Bryant-Park-feeling: Lights go on boom, boom, boom: 30 seconds of Lady Gaga s new song. But a lot of people I work with are willing to do things that could be considered a risk and dare to use slow songs or atmospheric ones. But the designers themselves are choosing the music? I ve also been doing some men s shows and once there was a designer who wanted to tell this story, but at the last minute one of his PR team came in saying No, you can t use this it can t have these slow parts. So they talked the designer out of what he wanted to do, whereas I told him to just do it I have never seen an editor walk out of a show saying Eh, I hate this song. Would you use a single song? For the Thom Browne Fall/Winter 2010/11 show we basically just used one piece of classical music which made it hypnotic. His show was really special. Did he select the piece or did you? He gave me an idea and I actually picked the piece I don t really know much about classical music, so I referred to other sources, because I feel part of my job is finding out. So I ended up calling up people who know a lot about classical music and took a kind of a crash course. It was only one piece in the end? We actually used three, but there were two little short ones for the intro and one main one that played for like 10 minutes. But it had a lot of quiet parts and loud parts. Do you take a look at the collections, or simply ask what it is about? Usually I go to the studio. Most of the designers show me their clothes. Sometimes I look at the line up and figure out if there is a mood or colour change. I don t really go to see some of the designers that I have worked with for a long time because I know what they do. Have you ever tried to try to talk the designer out of his idea? There is one designer I always talk out of what he wants, but I can t tell you who it is... If someone picked a really cheesy track, would you still play it? When I first started I was way more into talking people out of their ideas. But I actually like most of the designers I work with and if they came up with something which I think is a terrible idea, I would try and talk them out of it. Are you interested in fashion? Yeah, well...»the tracks, I end up thinking, are super popular and not well known in the fashion world because it is still weird Indie stuff.«...do you check on style.com, for example? I am not crazy about it but I do think it is interesting. There is a lot I would like to wear. Where to exactly? I d like to get a bunch of fancy suits. Every time I go: This year I ll drop a thousand dollars. I ll go to Barney s and check out the Dior suits but one thousand won t get you much of a suit. Someday. But I like all the people that I work with, like Mona from A Détacher, I think her clothes are really awesome. Thom Browne is interesting, his suits are so over the top. So fashion week is a busy season? A super busy season. Do you plan everything around it? Sometimes it is all happening all at the same time: Once my band was having a show the Saturday of New York Fashion Week and then I got a call time by VPL, so I was playing the show and the minute it was over I was like Ok, gotta go good job guys, bye.... But I do plan everything around it. I definitely have to be in New York in February and September. How long does it take you? When do they start? In the past I used to get the two-days-before-call but since I have worked with most of the designers for a long time by now, we usually catch up and start talking about it a month before. It gets really serious about two weeks before. A lot of the people I work with get it done early, others like Threeasfour who are very particular end up editing it right until ten minutes before the show. My first introduction to it was a call the night before saying: Can you do the show tomorrow? And Can you come down to the office right now and just talk to these people? So you have to come up with an idea very quickly? People ask Are you sure we ll have enough time? And I m like: I can do it the night before. But two to three weeks notice will definitely be better. What are the main difficulties of it? For the first two years every time somebody hired me I immediately had like a million suggestions from my records, but now that I have been doing it for so long I don t really like to re-use stuff. Unless it is really appropriate. I aim for everything to be different. Recently I ve started reusing things, from five years ago. Nobody is going to remember, but never with the same designer and I would never use it the same way. But is it hard to exclude your own taste? Sometimes I think this is strictly business but then realize it s always something I like. And it is different to when I hear other shows. I keep thinking that a certain song is very commercial, so everybody is going to use it like Animal Collective but then I head to the tent to do a show and hear songs that other designers use and they play Jay-Z and shit, whereas nobody is using Animal Collective, of course. The tracks I end up thinking are super popular, are not well known in the fashion world because it is still weird Indie stuff. Do you remember the first time you saw a fashion show and thought about the music? I came from a really weird perspective. I got involved in it through Threeasfour. But before I did their show it was even weirder: For their first two shows they had bands playing cut-up collage stuff and I thought that this was cool. Then I saw other friends who were doing downtown shows using heavy metal awesome, really theatrical. So I came to it from that side, seeing it as something really arty and creative; and then through PR got thrown into the business side. I was like Yeah, it s gonna be crazy and we will have weird sound effects and they said Eh, no we are not! But I have been able to fall in the middle where I can do both....using uncommon but not the totally weird tracks? Yeah, but I can also do the really straight shows I know what works for a big show, I know what s gonna sound good at the tent. But most shows you do don t happen at the tent, do they? I never had two shows at the same location. I ve probably been at like every venue in the city.» Are you sure we ll have enough time? I can do it the night before «

10 PAGE 16 / the SILENTIUM issue PAGE 17 / the SILENTIUM issue Only in New York? Ideally I d like to try and be able to work further than just New York and start spreading out and doing other designers in other places. There are not so many DJs who are specialized in doing fashion shows... The weird thing about the fashion week DJs is: There probably are not many people who do multiple shows. You have Michel Gaubert who is the number one guy and you have dudes like me. I looked at a lot of his playlists it s like there s three songs by the new hot techno guy. But if I was working as much as he was, I d probably do the same thing. What I do is centered towards what the designer wants, rather than suggesting the coolest, most fashionable record right now. I listen to what they want to do. One thing that is funny: I have all the music of the shows on my website. Sometimes I get people who want to work with me and they ll say what style do you do? And I ll be like: Go check out my website and they are like Ah, that s kind of weird and I m like: Yeah, but that s not what I d do for you....they like to stay on the safe side? It s not giving a promo CD saying that s what I do I spin house, I ll give you the newest hottest house music. But some people will also hire a DJ because they like HIM. That s interesting because that s what happens with these big designers, they hire a renowned DJ, to play music for 15 minutes and they ll actually bring in turntables. In that sense Michel Gaubert and people like me are the anomaly. So what is the most interesting part what is really exiting for you? The funny thing is a lot of the times the shows end up being this blur to me because I work really intensely with the designers for two weeks leading up to the show. And then suddenly fashion week starts and I have to do seven or eight shows in two days, so it s getting there, running, doing the music, making sure nothing goes wrong and then running to the next one and so on. But you do the mix before and when the music is running you have a little time to look at the fashion? I do most show music pre-mixed because I do a lot of custom editing, like re-editing the songs and making them more special and more unique. Behnaz Sarafpour for example is very conscious of the words in the song, she doesn t want anything that she doesn t feel and listens to all the lyrics. We ll actually go through it and if there s a verse which she thinks, this one is kind of a downer we d cut out verses and have extra choruses and repeat the parts that we like. I only do live mixing for when we have really specific cues. In Thom Browne s show for Fall/Winter 2010/11 season he had groups and each group had a specific song in the middle and that was all done live. I had backstage on my headset it was very choreographed to the models. The live mixing sounds challenging......if you were DJ-ing in a club, there are obviously points in the song where you would mix, but the problem with the fashion shows is the model is coming up, so you have to crossfade but it is in the middle of a word or a chorus nothing I would ever do in any other circumstance but... Due to the internet and YouTube, fashion week music has been established as an extra layer. It s also like a free ad for the musicians I get promos to play it in a show. It is a lot of exposure. In New York it s not such a big deal but the whole Michel Gaubert-Colette-thing broke out a lot of those bands in Outside the fashion week calender, what else are you doing? Currently a weekly party called Fever at White Noise club with this kid Nick Hinman. He is a model so it s a pretty fashion-y scene. The party was inspired by the music of the band The Cramps. So we play a lot of 50 s, 60 s Rock n Roll, Rockabilly, Garage Rock and Punk. You are also part of NY-based band The Better Letters... Yes, we actually just finished recording a new full length record titled Mixed Feelings, it will be coming out in March on vinyl. Other than The Better Letters and DJing, I have been making a lot of Hip-Hop music over the last year, I have been making beats for an MC named ACE 12 and working on an album called Back To Basics which is our take on classic early 90 s NY-rap. We put out a mix tape last fall as a sampler for the album we have been working on. I have also done some stuff with an artist called The Mr. Move. I mixed two mix tapes for him last year. Also I have been working on some remixes and stuff for some online fashion videos... So your life pretty much is about sound... Yes, but aside from making music I am a visual artist. In November I had my second solo show at Panda Gallery on the Lower East Side with works on paper, ranging from ink and water color drawings to collage. There ll be a limited edition book of my work soon, which is going to be released concurrently with a zine that I have been working on. For upcoming Fall/Winter 2011/12 season whose shows will you do? This season I am doing A Détacher, VPL, Behnaz Sarafpour, NOMIA, and Nicholas K, but it s still a few weeks away so I might add some more. A Détachers, Mona Kowalska is going to be very psychological almost like a mini movie soundtrack. VPL has a very distinct style to the show music, lots of layered samples and beats like their clothing. So we will be keeping that same vibe that I have done for them in the past and just moving it forward. What do you listen to yourself right now? What is your latest musical find? So much of my life is finding new records...but then on my ipod I listen to the same music I ve listened to for the last 20 years basically a lot to The Clash actually. ± color portrait by Dan Lecca backstage photos at A Détacher Show S/S 2011 by Joseph Chi Lin artwork by Ben Brunnemer SILENTIUM Where do I turn this off please? Seclusion strategies of monks, rappers and bourgeois in urban areas. illustration by Juana Robles lightenment. Glowing silently, reaching for the force inside, shining, at some time or another. By contrast, can one really bear silence when covered in Fruitof-the-Loom-triteness? Doesn t this require more Grandezza? A garb, a habit? Doesn t it call for the dignity of the druids or for something out of the Pet Shop Boys video It s a sin?» Keeping silent is simply not bearable, wearing apricot Fruit of the Loom sweaters «Cistercian nuns, for example, wore a tunic made from undyed gray or white sheep s wool, or a cowl, a long cloak with wide sleeves. For monks an extremely important, perhaps THE most important part of their cowl: The hood. It was worn as a sign of silence and had two purposes: Protection from the weather and cold and protection against people s looks. In addition, this type of cap shields off the senses, narrows one s field of vision and heightens one s concentration. The hood provides physical by Sharon Welzel In his song 4 33, John Cage recorded a couple of musicians for four minutes, 33 seconds doing nothing. Apart from that, there must be other ways to leave the noise behind, the overload, the juggernaut and enter the kingdom of quietness. In his Lectures on Nothing Cage offers the following thoughts about the dream of every city slicker, turned into a stereotype: We need not fear these silences, we may love them. Regard it as something seen momentarily though from a window while traveling. If across Kansas then of course Kansas, Arizona is more interesting. Especially for a New Yorker who is being interested in spite of himself, in everything Kansas is like nothing on earth and for a New Yorker very refreshing. Perhaps Ol Germany is just too densely populated for an alternative to Kansas. Therefore, the only place to enjoy all-embracing quiet is the monastery of silence. Here s the classic solution: Taizé, a monastery high up on a mountain in France. The people you would meet there are thirteen-year-olds, adventurous, undenominational pagan even, smoking joints in the garden of silence, sleeping in one room with twelve others, in bunk beds with army blankets full of lice, falling in love with the guy from the small house on the other side, hanging about the place, stealing postcards out of the letterbox, changing the content and putting them back in. All of this they do but their chattering doesn t stop. Others however come for that very reason: to keep silent. And it is certainly not a bad idea to settle one s thoughts. Most of the time however people forget to bring along the appropriate clothing for their activity. Keeping silent is simply not bearable, wearing apricot Fruit-of-the-Loom-sweaters. Other unimaginable colors when striving for the absence of noise are, of course, blank white, strident pink and popping blue. People wearing these colors like talking a lot, talking loudly without saying much. They are shades for being young, being loud and lively. Whereas one could imagine keeping silent in neon, in a glow-in-the-dark-look.buddhist monks wear bright orange robes, because for them, orange is the color of the highest level of human enas well as psychological protection. Hardly surprising: It has not only become part and parcel of streetwear, but fashion in general can no longer be imagined without it. Still, in different sub-cultures, with Hip-Hop leading the way, it hasn t yet lost it s function as a means of seclusion from everyday life and even from the secular world. The hoodie has various levels of meaning in this subculture. It not only serves as a demonstrative rejection of the surrounding world, but is also a hidden reference to one s own biography: I must not be recognized because I m dangerous or wanted by the police, and must not reveal who I am. According to youth culture, this is also a gesture of rebellion, but nothing new: The bowler hats with broad brim worn in the film noir fulfill a similar function through the deep shadow they cast on the face of their bearer, says Ulf Poschardt in his study Cool, the passer-by becomes a faceless warrior. But Hip-Hop is not the only subculture claiming these symbols as its own. Caps, earphones, hood, sun glasses they are cool tools, as Poschardt calls them. They are of particular necessity in situations where masses of people, noise and other influences prevail. It is therefore no coincidence that the first Sony Walkman was presented in the metropolis Tokyo in Other stereotypes of Japanese seclusion like face masks et cetera have become part of our collective consciousness; there is no need for further explanation. One thing however, is clear: The higher the overload, the more sophisticated the strategies to detract from it, if not into the kingdom of silence, at least into one s own kingdom. Isolation in the crowd should be entertaining, acoustically or otherwise. How much we depend on these cool tools becomes clear when, after a wasted night out, we are thrown onto the street into the daylight, without having one of these tools at hand. We find ourselves at the mercy of this blazing world, its passers-by and their looks we weren t prepared for, a world that pulls and drags and always wants something from you. I wear my sunglasses at night, so I can, so I can, see the light that s right before my eyes... But is that enough? Don t we need new strategies? If you browse through Harry Kühn s Picture Dictionary of Suits of Armour, you can find numerous starting points: visors, ventails, helmets and much more. One or two fashion week participants might actually have invented a new armor for the daily battle, who knows? After all it is just not possible to simply push a button and turn off this world around us a world that won t necessarily become quieter.

11 PAGE 18 / the SILENTIUM issue PAGE 19 / the SILENTIUM issue Isabel de Hillerin De Hillerin works with fabrics that have been crafted traditionally in Romania. She consistenly chooses plain off-colors, scarcely yet unerringly, copper set highlights in lots of gray, pastel green and beige. This combination, as Hillerin points out after the show, is her exploring the term patina. Sounds dull and old, but appears very light like it anticipated the summer: capes, boleros, neck lines down to the solar plexus or the bottom. Reoccurring, loosely held cloths produce excellent draping, combined with coarsely braided hair. I feel like driving immediately to the beach house at the Côte d Azur right out of Francoise Sagan s Bonjour Tristesse only without the drama, please. SW catwalk reviews Unrath & Strano I am late. The queue in front of the tent is unbelievable. I shout I just have to ask something, and force myself through the crowd. They hate me. Once I sit down beside the catwalk, the hype starts. Pictures of Franziska van Almsick and other celebs have to be taken and in a way, the show continues this trend: a lot of drama, a lot of glamour, a pinch of metal, a leather dress, and a lot of opulent draping at the back. Red lips, green shaded eyes, black nests of curls, Depeche Mode. Everything is bouncing to the beat: the hair, the drapes, the breasts underneath the dresses. Then, at the very end and to the tunes of Madonna s Like a Virgin, a blond-locked angel appears in a cocoon-shaped white wedding dress. Instant applause breaks loose as if this figure of light brings salvation after all the darkness. And I see the light I leave. Being too late SW Rena Lange Quality made in Germany is what describes the Rena Lange show best. High class and the right timing down to the last minute: 3 o clock sharp, the time when all ladies who lunch are sure to arrive last. They came and watched a wonderfully harmonic show, with excellent casting and unmistakeable seventies influences. Amazing colors, perfect business suits and of course the house s signature the black-and-white combination, which, by the way, was beautifully mirrored by the front row. Along sang Bob Dylan, who I d like to cite here: Come mothers and fathers throughout the land and don t criticize what you can t understand. This is what I d like to shout at the scenesters who maintain to have seen commerce here. AK Mongrels in common I am a fan of offsite shows. Tents, even those of fashion week, remind me of clowns and trained animals the circus is not really what I d consider the high point of glamour. Therefore I prefer a special location, and was truly rewarded with the Bärensaal at the old city chambers for the Mongrels in Common show. The dolled up audience alongside an army of columns and the high arched ceiling complement a pretty picture. Talking about pretty: Judging from my sense of proportion, the Mongrel s creations should complement almost every woman, whether voluptuous or extremely slender. Livia Ximénez and Christine Pluess send hip-friendly, draped dresses as well as über-tight pencil trousers stomping down the catwalk. But even if the palette, the art of pattern making and also the choice of models delighted me, I m afraid there is one thing I couldn t stand: Those yellow-green shining tights peeping from underneath the clothes were simply intolerable. AP Dawid Tomaszewski Perret Schaad Alight, ascend! It began with flashes, thunder, hail right on. Because great things were about to happen and thunder storms have a reputation of clearing the air. Dawid Tomaszewski s second show promises great things to come and to lead him to a golden future. Confident fairies presented a wonderful elegant-purist cocktail drama. Three-dimensional knitting met silk and chiffon. Dresses with feathers followed on from amazing tweed costumes and gorilla-like fur sleeves. Remarkable: the accesso- ries. The feathers on the girls heads were not the only thing reminiscent of Alexander McQueen. Another dead person who will sadly be missed and who would have loved this collection: Celia von Bismarck. AK After an amazing last season, the designer duo Perret Schaad - two highly talented girls who are obviously great personalities - once again proved how to define state-of-theart. A great personality, by the way, is exactly what you need to fit into their clothes. They empower with the expression of their own vision and celebrate uniqueness. The Fall/Winter collection is a poetic winter dream. The colors were super carefully chosen: Hard white softens a landscape of beautiful, gray pastels, pale green and a discreet rose shine on satin while petrol blues almost fall into deep greens. Serious simplicity meets impressive reliance. Girls, I really would like to spend an evening with you. Or at least wear your wonderful, floaty blue silk dress. But maybe it is already promised to Tilda Swinton, who would be the perfect match. AK catwalk photography by Volker eichenhofer Fammivedere.com Press factory

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