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History repeats itself and design repeats itself in redesigns all the time. Just like us, some what stuck in the past and repeating our old habits. The theme “Past Behaviour” inspired me to see how much we are affected by the past, as a person and a designer. “What if my grandmother was Coco Chanel?”, this question popped in my head while looking back at my personal design history and my design habits.
My maternal grandmother has always been making Korean Traditional dress “Hanbok” and as a child I saw it as some kind of magic. Since then I have been always been consciously and unconsciously putting the elements of Hanbok in my designs, and I realized that while I was looking through my own “Past Behaviour”. Coco Chanel, however, was a rebel, the revolutionary designer who had the power to change the past behaviour of women’s wear design of her times. So I though to myself, ‘What if my grandmother was Coco Chanel, what would she have done differently?’ and that was where my interpretation of the theme “Past Behaviour” and the idea of reinvention began. Through the layers of my grandmother’s traditional creations, Chanel’s layers of revolutionary modern designs, and my layers of interpretation of current trends, was bornmy collection title “Layers of Time”.
I looked at the current trends in design which included: Black &White contrast, Sheer & Solid Contrast, Multi Layers, Ruffles, Alpha Females, and Asia Society, and married these trends with Hanbok’s traditional elements and Coco Chanel’s revolutionary modern design. In Hanbok, layering and use of sheer and solid material together is very common, however they don’t have much of “Alpha Female” elements since women were not in much power in the times when Hanbok were designed. The Power Shoulders and more masculine silhouettes which was borrowed from Chanel’s men suit for women concept were added to the traditional look of Hanbok. I used a lot of black in my RTW design to create the atmosphere of Chanel’s look but experimented with layers and silhouettes to create today’s alpha female look: feminine, yet powerful. For the two couture designs, I wanted to reinvent the theme of Asia Society in current trend by seeing Hanbok designs through the modern eyes while keeping the theme “Layers of Time” visible.
Amy Ji Yee Kim is a Toronto based fashion designer who was born in Seoul, South Korea and came to Toronto in 1999. She refined her creativity and artistic skills through Industrial Design program at OCAD, Fashion Design programs at Ryerson University and George Brown College. She always liked to live in her creative world as much as looking into other people’s creative world with amazement. She enjoys life’s little things and appreciates details in designs. She wanted to be a violinist when she was little, but found that she was better at art and art made her really happy, so ever since then pursued the life of artist. She likes to craft and draw in her spare times, but her passion is in fashion.
Her brand name Maison Bergamasque was inspired by the French composer Debussy’s Suite, “Suite Bergamasque” which he started composing when he was 27 and worked on to complete until he died. The compositions in the Suite inspired her a lot and kept her going while she was at her creative work. She also started designing seriously since 27, and wants to follow Debussy’s steps.
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