Hannah Shin’s 3D-Printed Collection Takes Center Stage in Seoul

Hannah Shin’s 3D-Printed Collection Takes Center Stage in Seoul

Story by Kelly Nguyen
Oct 07, 2024

Hannah Shin knew the moment she opened a sketchbook, being a fashion designer was written in the stars for her. The Seoul-based Korean designer originally had plans to just work in an office as an adult. After seeing her father and aunt, an architect and a fashion designer, get consumed turning their artistry into a viable career, she thought opting for an ordinary life was the easier way to live. However, she would stay up all night, frantically sketching and jumping on the sewing machine as soon as designs came to life in her mind.

In 2022, on a whim, she decided to participate in a fashion brand showcase before she felt ready, wanting to assess interest in her brand. She quickly garnered interest from buyers and stars alike after the showcase, essentially jumpstarting the beginning of her brand. The following year, she was already debuting her collection on runways and being featured in boutiques in New York and Seoul and creating custom clothes in collaboration with artists like Aespa, Twice, IVE and NewJeans. “It seems like it just started as fate,” Shin told PAPER after her Spring 2025 show. This nebulous pathway in life, in taking leaps of faith not knowing what the universe has in store for you became the nucleus of this season’s collection.

Aptly named “Ghost Particle,” Shin’s Seoul Fashion Week collection was an examination into those moments when one gets lost looking into the cosmos and feeling so infinitesimal in comparison. For Shin, her collections were born from news, songs and movies she couldn’t get out of her head. After watching Oppenheimer’s explosive visuals on the way back from a show in Paris, she knew she wanted her Spring 2025 collection to speak to the intricacies of the extraordinary world we live in, even things we often brush off as ordinary.

In astronomy, particles are the components that ultimately form galaxies. Something so minute came together to create the sweeping universe we exist in today. According to Shin, this exploratory thrill of celestial bodies is similar to the draw of the deep sea — both worlds are expansive at the surface, with mystery brimming beneath. “The process of thinking about the collection in various ways with such a vague topic is the most enjoyable,” Shin said. “But also painful.”

Indeed, Shin's collections often examine life and death and technology’s role in both with an air of realism. For instance, this season's drew inspiration from the world’s first humanoid robot capable of piloting an airplane, developed by the Korean Research Institute of Science and Technology. This robot fascinated Shin, who couldn’t help but imagine what it would be like to experience riding the robot into space, but also it breaking apart among the cosmos. Delicate technology and how it plays with the brutality of nature often mingles in Shin’s world.

Translating these phenomena into high-octane garments, Shin’s collection consisted of incendiary pieces that challenged her artistry like never before. Melding 3D printing with biodegradable filaments, each piece’s construction was meticulously designed to be a visual marvel.

Shin’s ode to the ocean was evident throughout the show’s first portion: models were adorned with elaborate makeup, complete with pearls, starfish and stars attached to their hair, eyebrows, eyelids and cheeks. Wearing ready-to-wear lace tops and sheer sequin dresses, the lighting changed from moody reds to deep purples, with haunting music mimicking a siren’s cry. The ruching at the bottom of a glittery, second-skin dress was like a shellfish plucked from the sea.

As the looks became more intricate, the music became softer, like whispered humming. Naturally, this gave way to the biggest stars of her show, including dresses and skirts made out of small 3D-printed starfish, and a metallic Venus flytrap sea anemone. Her preeminent offering this season was saved for the finale: a 3D-printed chrome dress, structured to resemble an encompassing particle wrapping around the body. The delicate boning of the piece was made to look as though it was floating through air. Exploring new, unconventional materials, Shin described the difficulty in creating her work with materials never before used in fashion when crafting her futuristic couture.

“This season, we wanted to use large-scale, 3D printing as the main object of overlapping and intertwined irregular spheres and an underwater starfish object,” Shin said. “Not only modeling, but also printing, splicing and modifying [the materials] to wear on the human body was not easy.” Multiple accidents and snafus occurred during the production process due to the nearly impossible complexity of the dress.

In collaboration with 3D printing company Stratasys Korea and its engineers, Shin was able to engender a never before seen process that utilized biodegradable, sustainable filaments in creating clothing that was shock-proof and able to be worn by models for a show. Components to her outfits were printed in a linking structure through 3D modeling, and then connected by Shin’s sewing to make a cohesive fabric.

In between creating glamorous collections and wrapping up her doctorate degree in fashion design at Hongik University, she also has been honoring requests with K-pop groups in creating custom looks for tours and performances, working with members of Aespa and their stylists at SM Entertainment for the last year.

“The collaboration with Aespa was a lot of fun from the beginning, but it was also a difficult task that required a lot of effort,” Shin said. “All four members have very different charms, so we had to create a design that maximized each individual's charms, while making them look like one group. We also had to create costumes that had the feel of our brand while also being optimized for the songs and stages for the performance. It wasn't easy.”

However, Shin’s style ethos was easily recognizable, even within simple t-shirts that the group’s members wore onstage. Complicated beading, sequin work and chiffon tutus were made specific to each member’s style. For instance, Aespa member Winter’s delicate features were highlighted in an all-white, glittering corset ensemble, complete with a pearl headpiece that was later shown in Shin’s Spring 2025 collection. This outfit underscored Winter’s “ice princess” nickname coined by fans, and quickly became a favorite among them. Seeing her creations across the world as Aespa toured was “impressive and moving,” according to Shin.

Towards the end of the show, Shin ran out to join her models and bow to her audience, before quickly sprinting back behind them. For Shin, even as she’s pioneering new design methods, it’s of utmost importance for the clothes to speak for themselves and be recognized for the feats they are. Rarely sending out PR blasts, glimpses of Shin’s clothes nowadays really only make an appearance on stars, magazines, runways and on social media. Despite her brand being eponymous, it has grown and metamorphosed beyond simply belonging to her. “I want to be recognized as a new genre of fashion that is both flashy and technological.”

Photos courtesy of Hannah Shin