Watch Out For these Three British Birds
By Martha Violante
Joanne Stoker is blasting off on her third season with her eponymous luxury footwear line. Stoker's been fascinated with modern architecture since working as a model-builder to subsidize her shoe class fees. Stoker's designs are not only beautiful and luxurious, but truly radical; with heels shaped like Art Deco buttresses and illuminated by LED lights, inspired by the New York skyline at night. This month Joanne will showcase her LED light concept to the London public at an exhibition in Selfridges Shoe Galleries. Her shoes can be found at joannestoker.com.
Known for her extraordinary (and eccentric) handcrafted luggage, Sarah Wiliams is yet another young British talent to keep an eye on. Her most recent "Orient" collection was inspired by the luggage she imagined Agatha Christie and her husband Max would take with them on the Orient Express. But even Miss. Marple would be slightly stumped by Williams' bags, which are curved, jagged, stretched and super-inventive, but at the same time keeping true to the bespoke details of traditional luggage-making. Each piece is one-of-a- kind, 100 percent hand-stitched and available at williams-handmade.com.
After showing at London Fashion Week for the past three seasons, collaborating and creative-consulting with quirky Brit brands like Irregular Choice and musicians like Ebony Bones, 28-year-old designer Emma Bell has taken her skills abroad. She recently created a collection in Japan at the Paper Art Village -- an artist-in-residence program in Mino City that provides foreigners access to Mino washi, a type of Japanese handmade paper that's been made there since the Eighth Century. The resulting collection, which she's called "Colourful Creatures Are Often Poisonous," combines these paper designs with offbeat fabrics (polypropylene, vintage kimono, latex). Look out for a diffusion line to be sold on her website later this year at emma-bell.com.
Known for her extraordinary (and eccentric) handcrafted luggage, Sarah Wiliams is yet another young British talent to keep an eye on. Her most recent "Orient" collection was inspired by the luggage she imagined Agatha Christie and her husband Max would take with them on the Orient Express. But even Miss. Marple would be slightly stumped by Williams' bags, which are curved, jagged, stretched and super-inventive, but at the same time keeping true to the bespoke details of traditional luggage-making. Each piece is one-of-a- kind, 100 percent hand-stitched and available at williams-handmade.com.
After showing at London Fashion Week for the past three seasons, collaborating and creative-consulting with quirky Brit brands like Irregular Choice and musicians like Ebony Bones, 28-year-old designer Emma Bell has taken her skills abroad. She recently created a collection in Japan at the Paper Art Village -- an artist-in-residence program in Mino City that provides foreigners access to Mino washi, a type of Japanese handmade paper that's been made there since the Eighth Century. The resulting collection, which she's called "Colourful Creatures Are Often Poisonous," combines these paper designs with offbeat fabrics (polypropylene, vintage kimono, latex). Look out for a diffusion line to be sold on her website later this year at emma-bell.com.
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