Fashion 156

DAILY BLOG

FASHION156′S GUEST CONTRIBUTOR – DESIGNER FLIK HALL’S MOODBOARD

/ 16.12.11

Guest contributor Flik Hall has been blogging for us all week. On Monday she gave us a revealing 5 Question Interview, where she talked about her inspiration, her future ambitions, and some things she's learnt along the way. On Wednesday she created an atmospheric art piece using twinkling lights and some of the prints from her SS12 collection. Here she gives us a little visual insight into what's inspiring here at the moment.

Monica Cook – I like how Monica’s paintings portray a sort of beautiful reality that I think painters often avoid in portraiture. The way she paints the flesh of the men and women in her paintings enhances their presence; they seem almost raw and stripped of an outer shell, traditional in a way, but a layer has been removed to capture darker emotions.

Katja Mayer – collaboration with Peter Chadwick Days Lost from 2008 – 2011 I love reading these few sentences that were the inspiration for Katja Mayers photos. I just love the atmosphere a photo and a few sentences can conjure – it’s very powerful.   She rose with the skylight and shook a blanket of black dust from the sun- smoked skin that served as paste to her once elegant frame. The mind she called mother awoke to the creaking, dry, acidic taste on the breeze that said it would not be long before they came scratching around at play once more, such was the scarred enticement of her garden – occasional playpen spirits flying forever higher on the wing of a radioactive breeze…

Hilary Brace - Untitled (#Jan. 08) Charcoal on polyester film, 2008 Hilary’s drawings depict unsure places, real or not were unconvinced; they could be both water and clouds, part of somewhere we have never discovered on earth or another realm.

Image source: Monica Cook, Katja Mayer and Hilary Brace

Posted by: Katie Tillyer

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TAGS: Designer Guest Contributor, flik hall, guest contributor

FASHION 156

DAILY BLOG

FASHION156′S GUEST CONTRIBUTOR – DESIGNER FLIK HALL CREATION/ 14.12.11

Flik Hall, emerging womenswear designer is guest blogging all week, and following an illuminating 5 Question interview on Monday, where she talked about her ideal getaway and future plans, she created this unique piece for us of twinkly lights shining through one of her signature prints.

Here, she tells us about her creation: “For SS12 my collection encompassed prints of octopi; one print includes lots of tiny holes of the octopus’s suckers. I was intrigued to see when the holes were cut out, how I could create a pattern of the octopi that would span over a much larger scope than the body.

Trying out light was a natural jump for me, I was pleased to find when I used the right strength of light bulb, a lovely harmony between retaining the print and casting the pattern from the light could be achieved. I like to think the octopus is shining from within in a way.”

Image by: Jack Willsmore

Fashion 156

DAILY BLOG

/ 12.12.11

FASHION156′S GUEST CONTRIBUTOR – DESIGNER 

FLIK HALL 5Q INTERVIEW

We continue with our Designer Guest Contributing Series, and today have invited emerging womenswear designer Flik Hall to share the first of three post she will submit this week. We flagged up Flik's Spring/Summer '12 collection on the blog a little while ago, and were so taken with her oceanic inspired prints that we wanted to know a little more about her and her inspiration. Her playful clothing has had a real impact on the fashion world and as her profile as a designer starts to pick up some momentum, she tells us about her plans for the future, some disasters she's overcome, and what she would take to a desert island.

Your SS12 collection reveals a yearning for the wildness of the ocean. If you were washed up on a desert island, what 3 things would you wish to have with you? - My Acorn necklace that supposedly gives you a long life. - My ancient leopard waistcoat from my Great Aunt Bettie so that I could blend in with the other animals to avoid been eaten – I wish. - A solar powered CD Player.

Your current collection uses futuristic shapes and materials; what are your future ambitions for your label? I am always trying to find ways of using materials in a different way and I am very keen to branch out into other products such as shoes but not in a rush, just when it feels right but I would like to keep the business fairly small and exclusive. I want to continue to build my brand and work with more amazing people, there is always new opportunities arising.

Continuing with a watery theme, can you think of a time in your career when you have been thrown in at the deep end? and what did you learn from it? I have just received my leather back from the printers and it is entirely the wrong colour! It will takes ages to re-print and there are very few places that do it, I have only just calmed down and I received it two days ago. In the past, I left a garment that was part of my new collection on the tube and I never got it back, I had 2 days to re-make it before the look book shoot.

Sea travel has long been an escape from the hum-drum of daily life -what's your escapism? I make up little stories when I’m stressed and paint them and burn black coconut incense. I am going riding around the desert in Morocco and camping every night over Christmas.

Much of your SS12 collection is inspired by the colours and texture of octopi - do you have any other examples of finding beauty in the unconventional within your work? I would not say that I’m always inspired by the unconventional, there is just so many things that are not traditionally considered aesthetically nice that I think are beautiful. I am looking at lots of images of dentistry, fractures and luxation’s at the moment, which are fascinating. I found an old medical plate of the hipbone opened up and it looks like a flower is blossoming out of it.

Posted by: Katie Tillyer

L'Autre Magazine

Flik Hall SS12 Octi-Lace Skirt in L'Autre Magazine

L'Autre Magazine

Miranda Keyes for Flik Hall Nipple Tassel in L'Autre Magazine

Everzine

Black leather jacket by BEYOND RETRO, grey long coat by EKATERINA KUKHAREVA, grey jumper by THE ONLY SON, red leather collar shirt by FLIK HALL, pleated skirt stylist’s own, leopard shoes by UNDERGROUND.

SIX Magazine

by Rachael Oku

FLIK Hall

Under the SEA

A designer who has been impressing fashion editors with her striking prints since the conception of her eponymous brand in 2009 is Flik Hall. A Central Saint Martins graduate who worked for House of Holland before setting out on her own, Hall’s forthcoming offering for SS12, takes her trademark aesthetic for movement and print and juxtaposes it with luxury of the highest order.

Flik Hall’s SS12 collection film is created in collaboration with Ashley Joiner:

Inspired by the eroticism relating to the form and ethereal symbolism of the octopus and cecaelia; prints feature extreme close-ups of octopi skin and twisting tentacles, utilising a variety of textures to take on a life of their own. Using British-sourced fabrics, the effects are spellbinding: leather is emblazoned with eyelets to take on the guise of octopi suckers, while printed leather deftly appears transformed into lace, featuring punched out holes seductively exposing the wearer’s skin. Silhouettes are narrow and fluid, structured and free.

Clever use of materials such as Neoprene further enhance the consumer’s notion of their relationship with the water, playing upon the senses and bringing the collection full circle, demonstrating a marriage between civilisation and the natural world.

Cacophonies of colour intermix with gentle shades; peach, orchid and lilac sit alongside harsh yellows and slate blues. With all manufacture taking place right here in the UK, the results are dynamic and edgy. A romantic collection in the true sense of the word and a heady mix of fantasy, Hall’s designs represent femininity at its most potent.

L'Autre Magazine

H: So tell me a little bit about this new Spring Summer 12 collection? Where did all these ideas come from?
F: I knew from the beginning of this collection that I wanted to look at something quite textual. My Ideas wondered everywhere at the start like most collections do, initially I started looking into wet moist objects like sausages. Soon after I found myself wondering around Hackney market in the fishmongers looking at octopuses. As a whole I would say, artists such as Monica Cook and Kate D inspired my collection.

Above mood board of Ideas for FLIK HALL SS12 collection. 

H: What’s your favorite piece in your new collection?
F: It would have to be the shirtdress in the opening part of the film I did with Ashley Joiner. I like the combination of fabrics in this piece quite obscure, feminine and lustrous. It’s my favorite fabric in the collection. 

ABOVE FLIK HALL SS12 video "I hear you calling" by Ashley Joiner 

H: You collaborated with Ashley Joiner for your video, have you considered collaborating with other people? If so who and what would you do?
I actually have already done whole accessories collection for my SS12 collection with Miranda Keyes… Its not actually up on my website yet but we did a whole accessories collection made out of octopus, including a little octopus nip tassel.H: Have you ever eaten an octopus?
F: Yes

H: If you had a pet octopus what would you call it?
F: Emmanuelle 

H: What do you do when you’re not working?
F: I’ve always been interested in antique jewelry because my mums an antique dealer. I go around antique markets around Camden passage, Brighton, Glasgow and Oxford and collect jewelry. I also like making little instillations and pieces of art that I can put up around the home. 

H: What was the last exhibition you went to?
F: Frederique Morrel’s work in the Stephanie Hoppen Gallery on Walton Street I absolutely loved the couples work. 
H: If you had a fashion show how would you imagine it to look like?
F: It depends on the collection really but I wouldn’t necessarily have someone going up and down a catwalk… maybe something like having it on an ice rink for an Autumn Winter collection or something.

H: Have you thought about your Autumn Winter collection yet? 

F: I’ve already designed most of my new Autumn Winter collection… it’s not finalized though and there will be a lot of tweaks before its finished. When I usually work on a collection I always start on working with print first. I’ve been looking a lot into dentistry images of fractured limbs. Its not really going to be about obvious parts of the body it’s going to be more of a close up of sketches and textures around the body. I’ve also been looking at things like fossils. 

Autumn Winter or Spring Summer?
Spring summer 

How would you like to be remembered?
I would like to be remembered for doing something that was worth remembering such as my print because I put most of my ideas into print.