A handbag is function at its most essential a pocket, a strap, a buckle and with finesse it can transcend function into beauty, or something like it.
The head of design and production at Yu Mei in Wellington, Adrian Williams, is a holder of this knowledge, a master in accomplishing this wearable bridge to a delicate kind of harmony. It is something he has grown into over six years, after a serendipitous meeting with Jessie Wong, the brand's founder, in Dunedin.
Over about a decade, Adrian has built on the universe of his making. He began in the costume department of an advertising agency in Cape Town, his hometown, while studying a Bachelor of Fashion Design, before freelancing and eventually securing a role at South African design house Kluk CGDT, slowly turning the exercise of crafting the startlingly detailed into an authoritative art.
It seems natural, then, that at an angle from Yu Mei’s tiny party bags with scrunchie straps and sunshine-hued nappa have always been the principles of clothes.
“When you know the limitations [of raw materials],” says the 34-year-old, who takes each bag from concept design to prototype, from final mock-up to production, and does in-house refurbishments, “it’s like knowing the body in pattern-making. The difference is that with accessories, it’s more about the scale on the body than with the body. The rules of the two disciplines are different, but they can complement each other.”
Adrian says that design is always an open conversation. “Jessie and I have developed what I call the ‘Yu Mei DNA’, which we use as a guideline for each design, where function and aesthetics work together. This is what makes our products so recognisable as ‘Yu Mei’.
"It creates a connection between the products where similar techniques and finishings are used. The DNA is very intuitive, it’s when a prototype feels right. The DNA isn’t written in a brand manual, but we usually instinctively know we’ve reached it when we both say ‘I want one’.”
His next output, Adrion, his own label launching this year, feels destined, and sounds winningly contradictory. It’s as much an ongoing projection of his scaled-down sensibility, with gender-free, limited-run designs and a bespoke service, as it is poised for pure confection.
Advertisement
Advertise with NZME.There’s an overarching fondness for picking apart the rules of tailoring and construction, with a looped wool, floor-length coat in Kelly green, with an oversized pocket, a high slit and a high vent at the back for drama when you saunter.
He says it’s about crafting an “understated overstatement”, something that he admits sounds like an oxymoron, but combines “the small details of a style line with an obvious exaggeration or ‘moment’”, and where subtlety comes into play.
For someone who can intuit the DNA of a brand, who is a savvy remixer instinctively helping serve up the kind of brand authenticity wearers crave, and who has relinquished the fear of people not liking his designs (“I’ve taught myself to not take it personally”), one feels that the secret of Adrian’s work the source of its reverence is the fact that he designs for feeling.
“I see fashion as an art form, and not everyone likes the same art. It’s about being true to yourself.”
