When it comes to living our best life, fashion and interior design are complementary media. Anna Sui understands this better than most. With this in mind, the Museum at FIT hosted a public talk between the designer and Patricia Mears, curator of the exhibition ‘Designing Women: Fashion Creators and Their Interiors’. Showcasing famous fashion designers in their intimate living environments, the exhibition celebrates the intersection of these deeply influential and well-loved disciplines.
Speaking to Anna Sui, MFIT Deputy Director Patricia Mears revealed that Sui was the muse for the exhibition. The two talked about how Sui’s penchant for reinterpreting historical textiles and vintage clothing organically translated into the design of her unique, self-designed apartment. The designer’s apartment in Greenwich Village, already mentioned in the Vogue was reported is inspired by legendary interior design and style eras from the Victorian era through Art Nouveau to the rock ‘n’ roll scene and the bohemian eclecticism of the 60s and 70s.
Home is where the heart of a designer beats
“Designing a room is very similar to designing a collection,” Sui explained. A short video shows Sui wandering the rooms and talking to the camera about some of her favorite corners. In fact, the aesthetic of her catwalks can be felt in the maximalist fusion of velvet, silk, colour, pattern and prints. “The room that gets the most talked about is my bathroom,” she said, describing it as a perfect selfie spot due to its mirrored walls. Striking jewel tones complement the graphic black and white statements; a silver living room sits next to a red drawing room for watching TV and reading. The centerpiece of the latter is a chinoiserie-style cabinet filled with editions of the Vogue from the 1950s to the 1970s.
In the exhibition what fills the apartment is more important than the location or the architectural style of the apartment. While Anna Sui has scattered examples of stained glass around her home, images in the exhibition show fashion designer Jeanne Lanvin’s early 20th-century bedroom, decorated in opulent blue silk, inspired by the cobalt blue glass of medieval cathedrals. The color became known as Lanvin Blue, and Lanvin’s bedroom, decorated with objects by Jean Dunand, can be seen at the Musèe des Arts Decoratifs in Paris. In Greenwich Village, frosted wallpaper, an antique fireplace with tinsel artwork, framed vintage collections of butterfly wings, and many other myriad treasures that Sui calls her “objects of affection” set the backdrop for one of Anna Sui’s most prized possessions: one Kaftan worn by Elizabeth Taylor. Alongside a kaftan ensemble from Sui’s Fall 2012 runway is a picture of the designer at home next to her impressive bookshelf, designed for Elle Decor was photographed.
“I’m like a magpie, I see something shiny that attracts me and I’m blown away,” says Sui, who pins research images to the walls of her design studio at the start of each collection. But your walls at home are also fascinating. One room is decorated with small birds wearing strings of pearls, another with a peacock wallpaper by de Gournay, another with a mural designed by the illustrator of the Eloise book series, Hilary Knight. When she fell in love with a wallpaper in an old photograph of a Rose Cumming room, a similar wallpaper in New York’s Carlisle Hotel caught her eye and she immediately went to the front desk to find out where the wallpaper came from. Things that currently catch her magpie eye include “anything by designers Coco Chanel, Ozzie Clark, Bill Gibb or Zandra Rhodes, as well as rock posters from the Fillmore, art by Aubrey Beardsley, pottery and tiles by William de Morgan and furniture by James Mont. The more obscure something is, the more special it is,” she said, “and something becomes even more valuable when there’s a historical element, a story behind it.”
An aesthetic runs through every aspect of creation
The store design forms a mighty triumvirate with fashion and the home. The point-of-sale images featured in the exhibition – from Sui’s downtown Manhattan store, which occupied Soho’s Greene Street for 20 years, to Schiaparelli’s Parisian perfume boutique – demonstrate that the same creative impulses behind the room’s decor stand, also determine the shop design.
Sui spoke about the profound influence of ’60s London phenomenon Biba and how it influenced the design of her flagship store. Founded by Barbara Hulanicki and frequented by members and friends of The Rolling Stones and The Beatles, the Biba shop is featured in the exhibition as the epitome of second wave British design. It’s perhaps no surprise that Hulanicki, who received a British Knighthood for her services to the fashion industry, left fashion in the mid-’70s to become an interior designer.
70 exhibits from FIT’s permanent collection, ranging from dressing gowns to tea dresses, are presented in their period decor, and interiors featured range from luxurious, professionally furnished salons and apartments to modest, self-furnished studios and apartments. Other featured creatives include Lucile, Jeanne Paquin, the Callot sisters, Madeleine Vionnet, Coco Chanel, Bonnie Cashin, Diane Von Furstenberg and Tracy Reese. Complementing the exhibition are several large-scale illustrations by artist Bil Donovan, who combines beautifully crafted dresses with impeccable decor in his distinctive watercolor style. Spanning more than a century, these items are described in the press release as “an unsurpassed blend of art, craft, fantasy, comfort and kitsch.” But Sui expresses her approach to living her best life in simpler terms: “I think a lot of what I do is camp.”
The exhibition ‘Designing Women: Fashion Creators and Their Interiors’ ran until May 14 at the Museum at FIT.
This is a translation of an English post by Jackie Mallon. Jackie Mallon teaches fashion in New York and is the author of ‘Silk for the Feed Dogs’, a novel set in the international fashion industry. Translation and editing: Barbara Russ