Friday

If you wanna (b)ride...

To close out the 2005 Cloud Factory Design Collective show with the traditional bridal outfit, I created a costume inspired half by jockey silks, half by Lady Godiva. I had to have a horse, of course, so I found a vinyl horse head mask on eBay and talked two friends into sweating it out underneath the horse costume I whipped up. It was not easy staying up on that horse on the runway.

A couple studio shots:





And here is some footage of the entire piece from the audience:

Husky

After a few years of designing for slender young women, several of my male friends who leaned towards the heavier side started asking me when I was going to start making clothes for them. I called their bluff, and for the 2005 Cloud Factory Design Collective show, "Husky" was born! The music for this piece was the one and only Teddy Pendergrass singing "Turn Off the Lights."

Runway shots:













Here's some footage of Prince Pablo's stunning modeling debut:




In the time since I first posted this, our dear brother Otto passed away after a valiant battle with cancer. But he's with us all the time, and lives on not only in our memories, but in all the ways he showed us to appreciate what we've got and to GIVE THANKS each and every day. OTTOOOOOOOOOOOO!!!

Carmen-bot

The first time I heard the "Carmen" track by Sovereign on the Bingo Beats Vol. 1 album, I knew I had to use it in a fashion show piece. It's basically Carmen (as in the opera by Bizet), but with all robotic sounds. I decided to make Carmen-bot costume for the 2004 Cloud Factory Design Collective fashion show, and as luck would have it, I even managed to find a ballerina who had just choreographed Carmen for her MFA. A friend added some excellent airbrushed body paint to complete the look.

Studio shots:







Runway shots:







Polka-dot Polka

I'm Polish, and I love polka, so for the 2004 Cloud Factory Design Collective fashion show, I created a piece called the Polka-dot Polka. I designed danceable polka-dot dresses and we danced the polka all over that stage. The music was "Who Stole the Keeshka?"by Frankie Yankovic and his Yanks. Who doesn't love a polka?

Studio shots:











Runway shots:





Raver Gun Club

For the 2003 Cloud Factory Design Collective fashion show, my inspiration was the Raver Gun Club, a mock gun club some friends of mine had started. The Raver Gun Club has two mottos: "Protecting our right to gather peacefully by exercising our right to bear arms," and "Dancing by any means necessary." The music for this piece was "Sex Shooter" by Apollonia Six. The designs ranged from orange camo with cutouts inspired by hunting "blinds" to a stretchy, sexy number with little green plastic army men fringing the hem.

Studio shots:











Runway shots:









Shotgun wedding

To accompany the Raver Gun Club set, and to finish off the show with the traditional bridal gown, I created the Shotgun Wedding Dress, made of white satin and plastic toy guns spray-painted white. The "groom" was a toy shotgun. They made quite a pair.





Thursday

Hobots

Yep, hobots. Not as in ho-ish robots, but as in hobo robots. The theme for the fashion show at the 2003 Naughty Santa's Black Market was "trips," so I created brightly colored hobo robots, complete with matching bindle sticks (holding monkeys, of course) and jugs of moonshine. The soundtrack for this piece was a track by Tipper that always reminded me of what it would sound like inside a robot's intestines, sprinkled with samples of train sounds. Chugga chugga choo choooo!

Here are some runway shots:









it's the little things

For my first Cloud Factory Design Collective show in 2002, I created a piece called "it's the little things." I had previously made a "walking picnic" dress, complete with squeaky cheeseburgers, butterflies and trails of plastic ants. For the fashion show, I added four more gingham outfits, inspired by such things as tulips and my childhood bedspread. The soundtrack to this piece was a Greenskeepers track titled "Low & Sweet," a housed-up bluegrassy song. Since the song heavily featured a cowbell, I added an "Asian Buckwheat" to play the cowbell onstage, because you can always use more cowbell!

Of everything I've created, this piece is still the closest to my heart.

Studio shots:









Runway shots:





Freakazoid Robots

For a fashion show at the Naughty Santa's Black Market in 2002, I did a piece inspired by a Freq Nasty track that sampled "freakazoid robots, please report to the dancefloor." It started with grey, angular robots, reminiscent of drab office cubicles, walking to a track by Matmos that sounded like office equipment gone amok.

When the robots broke down, an orange jumpsuit-clad worker attempted to fix the robots, pulling open secret panels to reveal green satin motherboards with gold embroidery and colored plastic "wiring."

The robots gained control of the worker's remote control, switched the music to Freq Nasty, and proceeded to get freaky. As the robots ripped open the secret panel on the worker's jumpsuit, it became apparent that the worker was a robot too!

Here are some studio shots: