Buried within the Paris Fashion week calendar between Rick Owens and Nina Ricci, the listing for London-based Aganovich's Spring 2010 presentation was easy to miss. Their clothes shown in their show at a contemporary Paris gallery, however, were not: The show was by far one of the most successful expressions of art-meets-fashion exhibited all week.
Nana Aganovich and co-founder Brooke Taylor's London-based line -- made mostly of antique linen, which contains nettle and has a heavier, stiffer feel than the fabric's modern incarnation -- was displayed in different scenes that drew from conceptual inspirations, including the melting of Greenland. Blocks of ice next to three dresses evoked the country's frozen terrain, while the clothing's S-shaped lines conjured rivers. Another abstract display, influenced by the Spanish sculptor Juan Munoz, featured disembodied mannequin legs dangling from the ceiling above several mannequins wearing Aganovich pieces. "We thought, 'What would upset the mannequin the most?'" Taylor explained. “That they don't have legs."
Both designers come from globetrotting backgrounds: Aganovich, is a dual-national born in Belgrade to Serbian parents who relocated to Copenhagen, and Taylor is an Irish-American born in Monte Carlo. Aganovich, a graduate of the MA program at Central Saint Martins, had just returned from China after relinquishing her share of an operation of machine-based, demi-couture clothing called Missing Sock Studio when she met Taylor. They founded Aganovich in the UK in 2005.
Despite the line's striking ability to incorporate art into their work, the clothing speaks for itself through its exceptional construction and design.
Does the duo think they will continue to take this arty approach to fashion? They're not sure. As Taylor reminded us, "After all, we are not artists, we are fashion designers."
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