Her canvas is fluid and three dimensional, not square and hanging on a wall. It’s the dress. What seemed like a missed opportunity to her family and the teachers in art school, is a blessing for the fashion world. The painter within Renata Morales says it takes her a long time to create something decent. It is hard to believe when seeing her new collection.
Her metallic obsession this fall is in the spirit of the mod squad, a trend seen on the runaways this season, yet it is definitely less Twiggy and more fairy-like. Constantly evolving by way of trial and error, as she says, learning by way of adding and subtracting, she remains free of the production line constraints of the prêt-à-porter, and brings fashion back to its artistic roots.
She’s inspired by the not-yet-mainstream Montreal music scene. While she was telling me about her infinite pleating and reworking of fabrics, she was working on costumes for the Arcade Fire show at Pop Montreal. The Arcade Fire lads are friends, they always include her in their ventures when they can, and Regine is THE Morales dress fan. Renata also collaborated with Claire Boucher on the Grimes videos, transforming the singer and visual artist into a mythical hawk figure in Crystal Ball. The day of the interview, she was listening to Justin Bieber (sic).
She is currently part of a festival in Hollywood celebrating Quebec creativity, along with fellow Quebec designers Denis Gagnon, Philippe Dubuc and created a piece for the MMFA Big Bang show opening this month. I sat down with Renata for a Q&A to pick her brain about this year’s fall fashion, turn the page to take a look.
Q: How would describe your fall trend?
A: Contrary to what I do normally, and I don’t know what’s the trend for everybody, but I have been working a lot on black, with a lot of accents of color, and very light fabric but a lot of them metallic and shiny fabric.
I also love pairing my dresses with a lot of big accessories, big earrings… I feel like making very rich looking clothes right now, texture-wise.
Q: You say that you get your inspiration from visual arts, which artist do you think influenced your fall collection?
A: If I would compare what I am talking about to a visual artist, whose esthetic would be close to what I’d like to make, it would be El Anatsui. I believe he is from Ghana, and he is an incredible texture builder. He works with different kinds of metals and fabrics.
Q: Would you say that you make costumes for the everyday woman who likes to dress-up?
A: I concentrate on working on the dress. Its basics, but most of my dresses tend to go on the extreme side, or the more eccentric side. Even if I work tone on tone, very textured, I think that it is definitely a dress-up dress. But the way fashion is right now, it does not mean that people cannot wear it for the day.
Her canvas is fluid and three dimensional, not square and hanging on a wall. It’s the dress. What seemed like a missed opportunity to her family and the teachers in art school, is a blessing for the fashion world. The painter within Renata Morales says it takes her a long time to create something decent. It is hard to believe when seeing her new collection.
Her metallic obsession this fall is in the spirit of the mod squad, a trend seen on the runaways this season, yet it is definitely less Twiggy and more fairy-like. Constantly evolving by way of trial and error, as she says, learning by way of adding and subtracting, she remains free of the production line constraints of the prêt-à-porter, and brings fashion back to its artistic roots.
She’s inspired by the not-yet-mainstream Montreal music scene. While she was telling me about her infinite pleating and reworking of fabrics, she was working on costumes for the Arcade Fire show at Pop Montreal. The Arcade Fire lads are friends, they always include her in their ventures when they can, and Regine is THE Morales dress fan. Renata also collaborated with Claire Boucher on the Grimes videos, transforming the singer and visual artist into a mythical hawk figure in Crystal Ball. The day of the interview, she was listening to Justin Bieber (sic).
She is currently part of a festival in Hollywood celebrating Quebec creativity, along with fellow Quebec designers Denis Gagnon, Philippe Dubuc and created a piece for the MMFA Big Bang show opening this month. I sat down with Renata for a Q&A to pick her brain about this year's fall fashion, turn the page to take a look.
Q: How would describe your fall trend?
A: Contrary to what I do normally, and I don’t know what’s the trend for everybody, but I have been working a lot on black, with a lot of accents of color, and very light fabric but a lot of them metallic and shiny fabric.
I also love pairing my dresses with a lot of big accessories, big earrings… I feel like making very rich looking clothes right now, texture-wise.
Q: You say that you get your inspiration from visual arts, which artist do you think influenced your fall collection?
A: If I would compare what I am talking about to a visual artist, whose esthetic would be close to what I’d like to make, it would be El Anatsui. I believe he is from Ghana, and he is an incredible texture builder. He works with different kinds of metals and fabrics.
Q: Would you say that you make costumes for the everyday woman who likes to dress-up?
A: I concentrate on working on the dress. Its basics, but most of my dresses tend to go on the extreme side, or the more eccentric side. Even if I work tone on tone, very textured, I think that it is definitely a dress-up dress. But the way fashion is right now, it does not mean that people cannot wear it for the day.
