Budapest Fashion Week Act 1 – Fashion and social responsibility?
The now long-standing Budapest Fashion Week has been held for the 27th time. This year, the event was once again held in the impressive building of the City Park Ice Rink.
On the first day of the Budapest Fashion Week autumn/winter season, all the current topics that are relevant in today's world and encourage activity were on the table. Among the topics that emerged were the seas, preserving tradition, war and saving animals. We saw more classic and absolutely contemporary collections.
The designers of the first day were: SUZA, MELYNDA FELTING, ZIMITS ANDREA, SIDLETSKYI, DAEMON
SUZA Design Studio
The designer designs and produces casual and wedding dresses, as well as theatrical costumes, based on individual orders, and regularly appears each season with her own branded casual "pret a porter" and wedding dress capsule collections.
The collection represented a more classic line, the intention was to emphasize the feminine line. The colors were exclusively black and white, the materials were satin, lace, and thicker lined materials, sometimes softer, sometimes stiffer lines. From a professional point of view, we did not see anything new or outstanding in terms of tailoring in the collection, but for those who like classic clothes, the brand can be a perfect choice.
Melynda Felting
The designer started out as a textile painter, then truly fulfilled herself as a felt artist. She works with the Nuno-felting technique, a process that allows her to combine the traditional technique of felting with modern, yet natural materials. According to her, all clothes are made by hand, using water and soap, without sewing. What I wondered professionally about this was how the waist straps of the skirts were designed to stay in place? Unfortunately, I was unable to shed light on this question. The collection was called “Flow”, and its characteristic feature is that the clothes reflect all the shades of the color of water. The designer used silks and wool of different textures as raw materials, and her goal is not to hide it, but to show the beauty and use of an ancient technique in modern clothes that can be worn today.
Between the presentations Xenia Toth We saw the performance “Stop the War!” by the artist. It is important for him to reflect on the issues of our society and to depict the battles we fight within ourselves and in our environment.
Sidletskyi
Volodymyr Sidletskyi, from Ukraine, graduated from Khmelnytskyi National University in 2020 with a degree in fashion design. Despite his young age, the designer has won numerous awards in his home country and is already considered a great hope for the future.
The brand's mission is to emphasize the importance of thinking about animal protection and ecological sustainability. I really liked that we saw mostly professionally beautiful designs from this brand, perhaps with one design when patterned material was worked into the shirt in two different directions, but unfortunately this caused the piece to be slightly visible due to the wrong direction of the clay fibers, and the piece almost stretched in one direction on the model. Apart from this small tailoring flaw, the design was demanding throughout the entire collection, and it was clear from the clothes that they were made of well-selected quality materials. The concept of the collection also came through absolutely. We loved the varied applications on the back of the pieces. It was refreshing to see high-quality, contemporary menswear creations on the catwalk that you would gladly put on any fashionable man.
Andrea Zimits
By his own admission, he is a supporter of “slow fashion”, which is apparently manifested in the fact that he creates unique pieces, and not small series pieces. His clothes are bold, interesting, if we are cool and adventurous enough, then his creations are absolutely made for us, as we can see unconventional clothes from the designer. In the recently presented “Jeans Conception” collection, we could see denim-based clothes, disassembled and recreated, in a deconstructed form, sometimes supplemented with tapestry and lace, thus combining antique and modern influences on the clothes.
DAEMON Couture
Kata Domokos, the brand's designer, considers environmental awareness important, which is primarily manifested in the production process, as she believes that unique, handmade design products represent real value compared to mass production, which is why accessories and clothing are available in limited quantities. A maximum of 9 pieces of each model are made per color.
In terms of raw materials, it is mainly leather or vegan leather, but waste or recycled nylon and plexiglass also appear in her creations. She combines folk leather decoration techniques with modern technical tools, as preserving tradition is also important to her, while representing contemporary design. In the collection, we could often see bat and snake motifs applied to the pieces. What was our personal favorite were the beautifully crafted and special bags.
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