Nicole Van Vuuren’s Collage Of Textiles & The Value Of Communal Fashion

A vanguard of fashion designers is bringing unapologetic creativity and community back in style.

As we head towards the last remaining days of 2022, we reflect on a handful of emerging brands that took it upon themselves to persevere with small and thoughtful collections supported by equally small and thoughtful presentations and runway shows, reframing the much-needed emphasis on celebrating creativity in its purest form, particularly within an industry such as fashion.

Last month, fashion designer Nicole Van Vuuren presented her latest designs alongside Reparation Studio, Starving Artists Fund and jewellery brand Too Cruel To Be Kind, the key focus on showcasing fashion free of commercial constraints, offering the “opportunity for the garment to be taken outside the context of the commodity” explain the show notes.

“Instead, presenting a narrative for the future of fashion — the application of ideas transcending the paradigm of the single wearer, single designer, single viewpoint in favour of building a community around a shared experience.”

The runway event, held at Open Cafe on Karangahape Road, exhibited new work by these complementary designers, displaying the power of collective creativity and putting the spotlight on how emerging brands are tackling the concept of sustainable and ethical making for a new generation.

“Stepping away from the hierarchies of a traditional runway and instead exploring a collective experience grounded in community principles” is how the collective described the event “bridging the runway with the every day.”

Self-described as “just a girl, exploring fashion through mundane interactions between body and cloth”, Nicole’s work favours the imperfect and unfinished. Her NVV World multi-brand studio situated on Karangahape Road supports fellow emerging designers who are engaging in new modes of sustainable design, encouraging community through collaboration. It’s a way of working that resonates with Viva.

“Community and diversity, those wearing the clothes, and the act of wearing itself all feed back into my design practice,” says Nicole, whose impressive resume so far includes completing a bachelor of fashion with honours at RMIT University in Melbourne, along with a stint working for cult New York-based label Eckhaus Latta.

“I’ve been going back to my roots a bit in this collection with old readings from Claire Bishop, Boris Groys, Jaques Ranciere, Guy Debord and Dysfashional, and really thinking about context and presentation in fashion.”

Here, Nicole discusses running a runway show, relinquishing creative control, and how she plans on relaxing.

As a creative who believes in collective power, what have been some of the key learnings you’ve taken from your fellow contemporaries?

For me, fashion school was a special, formative time where you are always working surrounded by others, critiquing each other’s work and bouncing ideas off one another.

After leaving that environment and moving back to New Zealand, I definitely felt quite isolated in my practice, so a big goal was to recreate that kind of community-making environment through a studio where we could share resources and knowledge. Group thought and critique is so valuable to strengthening ideas and values and pushing each designer’s practice further, conceptually and technically.

I was definitely inspired by my time at Eckhaus Latta, whose studio is very much a collective where all ideas are valued equally — seeing how that translated into better garment design, where everyone brought different skills to the table to tackle design problems, with the designers being strong enough in their vision to produce a really strong aesthetic. And their community approach to putting shows together, too.

I was lucky to study under Ricarda Bigolin (D&K) and Adelle Varcoe, who challenge contexts and hierarchies in fashion, and their conceptual and research-based practices influenced my own approach to fashion.

Also, Noa Records and their organic collaborative approach to music-making where sounds respond to one another and the environment they are in, and Jessica Jay of Reparation Studio, who adds design through repair to existing garments. They all challenge the hierarchy of the one-designer model of fashion.

Scrap fabrics are a major source of resources for you with your designs. What inspires you about working with repurposed materials?

I love that they set design constraints on my practice, which challenges me as a designer to find ways of working with the colours, sizes, shapes and textures of the textiles available to me.

I also enjoy that the final product becomes embedded with a narrative of the history of all the different sources of fabrics included within it. With that in mind, I’m working on launching a bespoke service next year so that clients can bring in old garments or textiles that hold value to them and have them recontextualised in a new piece they can wear.

What did you enjoy most about the runway show format you worked on this year? What challenges did you face that people might not be aware of but could offer support for?

Honestly, the most enjoyable thing was the enthusiasm from every single person involved — it really warmed my heart. Everyone got along so well and the day went smoothly. I think that love for the cause came across to those viewing the show.

In terms of challenges, creatively, I think as designers we can get quite used to having complete creative control over how our work is presented, and to present in a group show context takes away some of that creative control, so, again, I’m just really thankful to the designers involved for being flexible in that regard to create a unified look across styling, choreography and sound.

This was my first experiment with some of the ideas, so I’m looking forward to opportunities to push them further in the future. However, the biggest challenge with a presentation like a runway show is obviously funding, especially with creative funding like CNZ being closed off to fashion practitioners.

It’s a big thing to self-fund, on top of producing a collection. I think the lack of support and funding for emerging designers is a big part of the reason we don’t get to see many presentations by emerging designers in New Zealand, unfortunately.

With the number of people and time that contribute to the production — the models, venue, sound, lighting, hair, makeup, backstage crew and friends and whānau around to lend a hand — I can’t thank everyone who volunteered time, offered koha, or were flexible with rates to help work to a limited budget.

The easiest way to support emerging designers is to buy the clothes, obviously. But also, we love to hear from anyone interested in getting involved in our events. The goal with NVV World is to create a space that makes fashion presentations more accessible to other designers, too, and the creative practice involved spans much wider than just the fashion designers who participate.

How will you be relaxing over the summer and what are you looking forward to wearing the most?

I’m looking forward to some time with family, heading up north with Jess from Reparation Studio, wearing my Sleeping Profit bikini, lounging on the beach and reading the new Ratworld magazine and a few new books I ordered from Blue Flower Texts.

As a workaholic, I’m also excited to spend some time doing a few little renovations to our showroom space, ready for a fresh re-opening and space for some workshops and community events next year.