Clothedstories really sprouted years ago, in witnessing the magic of shared meals: the simple ritual of eating brings people together, regardless of hierarchy. I could not articulate the same enthusiasm for fashion, nor could I convincingly answer the question, “What does your practice do for others?” Aside from the differentiation of survival and pleasure - clothes and fashion; food and gastronomy -  the discomfort of how two such essential things for humans can be so different in its meaningfulness in daily life convinced me to think that fashion should also bring joy and connect people in the way that food does.

My quest began with a dinner event, My First Supper (April 2016), a year before Clothedstories was completed. It was an attempt at bridging food and fashion by exploring their common ground: a sensory experience. An updated version of the event, Dinner Chapter I (September 2016) was officially held at the Parsons Paris Gallery to begin the year-long project of Clothedstories.  With the aid of research methods and materials from other disciplines, the whole project aimed to discern values in fashion design that go beyond the monetary and the aesthetic. The final garments were made for the six participants who attended Dinner Chapter I. The conversations and shared situations between the six designated wearers and myself as clothes-maker allowed design, production, and presentation to remain a holistic exercise. What resulted was an intimate network of stories surrounding the garments, restructuring fashion design processes and outcomes to be flexible. The interchangeability of these different steps allow all parts to reflect the various human exchanges and collaborative effort involved, creating new meaning and dynamics in practicing fashion.

This is a glimpse into my utopian vision of fashion, centralised on the idea of dialogue with the self and the surrounding social and physical environment. Here I invite you to see clothing as mobile and transformative vessels of intimate and shared life.