Fiona O'Neill hand-paints dresses for Central Saint Martins fashion show
Black outlines framed the distorted silhouettes of painted dresses in Central Saint Martins fashion graduate Fiona O'Neill's collection, presented at the institution's catwalk show earlier this week.
Fiona O'Neill hand-painted the garments in her BA Fashion collection with blended pastel colours, influenced by art depicting Japanese women in traditional dress.
"My inspiration for this collection was women painting women, mainly derived from the artist Kate Blacker and her geisha series of painted women," O'Neill told Dezeen.
"A lot of the patterns for this collection are large free-hand drawings that I materialised and manipulated," she added.
The silhouettes were warped to distort the body shape at the shoulders and hips, further emphasised by the black lines that edged the garments when seen from the front.
Asymmetric sleeves, sometimes integrated into the torso to restrict arm movement, also contributed to the altered proportions.
One and two-piece outfits reached up to the chin or sat below the shoulders, with all but one dress extending down to the ankles.
O'Neill teamed technical and elasticated fabrics with canvas-like materials that absorbed the paint but still allowed for movement.
"I wanted to create the idea of a stiff cut out but obviously the girls needed to be able to walk comfortably," said O'Neill.
Also at Wednesday's Central Saint Martins show, Sang Yoon presented garments with chunky sleeves made from injection-moulded plastic cylinders.
Photographs are courtesy of Catwalking.com.