5 Designers to Know From Seoul Style Week Slide 2021

It was just about a 12 months back when Seoul Manner Week grew to become just one of the initial significant fashion functions to fall target to the coronavirus. Owing to South Korea’s locus as an early hotspot for the pandemic, the announcement of its postponement was created while Paris Fashion 7 days was continue to very a lot underway. Even though the condition in South Korea is at the moment secure, the week’s organizers were eager to assure that this season’s occasions went in advance as responsibly as possible, with all of the demonstrates live-streamed with no an audience. Nevertheless what emerged from these limitations was a surprising volume of creative imagination, with several of the week’s standout collections coming by way of younger and rising voices. 

Less than normal situations, the the greater part of exhibits would just take area in just the grandiose setting of the Zaha Hadid–designed Dongdaemun Design Plaza which, although convenient, features very little area for designers to experiment with how their collections are introduced. A single silver lining to arise this time, then, was the broader variety of backdrops, with designers checking out areas from the hallowed halls of the National Museum of Korea to the leafy environs of the Han Riverside Park, affording them the prospect for much more cohesive world-making alongside each individual selection. This mix of locations showcased more of what Seoul has to give as a style and design funds, even from afar—something the week’s organizers would do nicely to keep on with even when normality returns. 

The highlights arrived by way of common faces such as the earlier LVMH Prize-nominated Minju Kim, who showed off-program far more proven Korean names like LIE and a range of rising skills, like Hanacha Studio and Painters. Alongside one another they produced for an eclectic mix that demonstrates the rich patchwork of style scenes that have made Seoul a trend capital.

Here, find the 5 designers to know from Seoul Style Week’s tumble 2021 time. 

LIE

As one particular of the additional proven names on the Seoul Style 7 days routine, designer Chung Chung Lee of LIE confirmed his selection in the colossal plaza outside the house the Nationwide Museum of Korea. It was a suitably epic location for an outing that featured impeccably-reduce and straight away desirable separates and outerwear. A quantity of particularly persuasive items ended up inspired by horse driving, including a cropped, belted coat with a crossover shoulder depth and saddle-model leather baggage dripping with tassels, buckles, and even stirrups. The most playful accessory? A driving crop. 

Minjukim

Arguably Korean fashion’s biggest achievements tale of the earlier several decades, Minju Kim’s delightfully frou-frou smocked attire and charming oversized coats went global right after she emerged as the much-deserved winner of Netflix’s Future in Vogue contest, earning $250,000 from Internet-a-Porter to launch a new assortment on its site. Even though Kim primarily chooses to present off timetable, she premiered her slide 2021 selection with a slick seem e book that saw her place a sharper and far more graphic spin on her girlish structure signatures. (Highlights involved bunny rabbit-adorned knits, cardigans featuring abstracted slice-out florals motivated by Edward Scissorhands, and a sequence of flouncy attire with outsized shoulders and peter pan collars.) She may possibly be 1 of the week’s far better-identified names, but with a collection that continued to move the dial forward, Kim evidently isn’t resting on her laurels. 

Hanacha Studio

A graduate of the London School of Fashion, Hana Cha of Hanacha Studio emerged as 1 of the week’s standouts with a selection that fused extraordinary silhouettes with painterly prints to type a unique and darkly intimate whole. Whilst the designer is known for her intellectual POV—she not too long ago completed a PhD at Seoul’s Hong-ik College on the relationship amongst the Bauhaus movement and fashion—there was a lightness of contact existing in the crystal fringing working alongside the hems of coats and jackets and the paint-spattered denim pieces. This 7 days, Cha founded herself as an remarkable new talent to preserve an eye on.

Pian

When Seoul was an early outpost for genderless dressing, there’s still a wealthy tradition of inventive men’s tailoring current in the metropolis courtesy of longstanding models like Münn and Caruso. The most recent name on the block is designer HyunHo Kim of Pian, who showed his selection of off-kilter tailoring at dusk underneath a bridge on an island in the Han River. Balancing ease and comfort with a louche, dandy-esque glamour—and a final dose of Dickensian dishevelment—his tumble collection consisted of three-piece fits and peacoats slash from washed linens and addressed jeans, when Junya-esque patchwork elements were presented a refreshing update by using exposed seams and asymmetric fastenings. It was fascinating to see a menswear designer stand out as a person of the week’s most intriguing voices, not the very least with a assortment as resourceful as it was covet-deserving.

Painters

This season’s wild card was Painters, the brainchild of designer Received Jeon, who was awarded the H&M x London Faculty of Style Structure Award in 2015 prior to developing his label 3 decades ago. Possessing emerged as 1 of Seoul’s wittiest and most playful designers, Jeon’s signature topsy-turvy proportions, kaleidoscopic eye for colour, and surprising textures were being out in complete power. Warped, bulbous attire arrived wrapped around the system in cloud-like cottons and shiny bin liner blacks, when a notably memorable piece slice from a fluffy gray fake fur showcased a kangaroo-like protrusion at the midsection as beguiling as it was weird. It seems the emergent pattern for oversized, enveloping proportions is one that Jeon is fully on board with.