The Symbiotic Relationship Between Fashion and Furniture
“A fashion designer's eye for style can't be confined to clothing,” explains Diane Von Furstenberg at Milan Design Week this March, shedding light on the relationship between fashion and interior design.
From their common thread of creativity to being influenced by the same trends and artistic climates, the two worlds are intertwined in various ways. This commonality has inspired a whole array of collaborations and ventures between these two different forms of the same art. Society has accordingly followed suit to this unison among designers and have come to desire a whole lifestyle experience: if you care about the way you look, you probably care about the way you live. For designers, this alliance brings forth an inundation of new opportunities to use their talents in a novel way; and for people like us who want to express ourselves, an inundation of choices – making for an exciting time in the complex and dynamic world of design.
Milan Design Week’s Furniture Fair at the Salone del Mobile saw its greatest number of fashion brands showcasing their new collections – not for the body but the home. With Bottega Veneta’s stated leather pieces in their classic crisscross, Fendi Casa’s eye-catching line-up and Marni’s Playland of PVC furniture handcrafted by Colombian women, interior design was brought to the forefront by fashion’s biggest names. Fashion has always been more glamorous, omnipresent and familiar to the common man than interior design has, which is one of the reasons why Milan’s Design Week is always such a rave – it enables fashion to give interior design the hint of fame it deserves.
Just as the title of this article suggests, however, this relationship between the two main spheres of design is a symbiotic one - just as fashion helps décor, décor also helps fashion in a multitude of ways. For one, fashion designers are able to spread and solidify their brand identity in a completely different market. This requires the architectural acumen of interior designers, without which these ventures would be too big a challenge.
During my trip to Milan this summer, I was able to witness the craftsmanship of these collaborations - acclaimed interior design firm JCPassion’s and Roberto Cavalli, luxury Italian furniture maker Promemoria and Hermès, Zara Home and Isabel López-Quesada, and Topshop and Wedgewood’s new high-street décor project. We browsed everything from home accessories to bedding, and the frequency with which fashion and interior design collaborations came up was pleasantly surprising! Having also visited some furniture makers’ factories, I witnessed the precision with which these works of art are created, and realized how underplayed the skill of interior design is, as compared to fashion design. I remember staring in awe as one of the workers layed crimson leather onto a grand sofa. While my appreciation for interior design certainly increased in Milan, so too did my fascination for fashion. Seeing the breadth of these designer’s talents and their versatility across fields of design was invigorating.
These collaborations aren’t limited to new home wear collections – they are partnerships in which fashion brands seek the help of their counterparts to design their stores and their runways, to ensure that there are no gaps in their brand image and no untapped opportunity to attract more consumer attention. Club Monaco, for example, has used the services of its interior design partner Mary McDonald to turn its stores into as much of a masterpiece as its clothes. Lying in the heart of the Flatiron district, this store has now garnered more attention for its décor than the clothing it houses – a coalescence of vintage and contemporary, bold and subtle, playful and elegant takes shape in this room of whites, marbles and jutes.
