In 2008, the Cloud Factory Design Collective decided to change things up and produce a show in the fall, rather than the traditional spring show. I took advantage of the change in season to move away from my traditional lighter fare and spring colors, opting instead to create dress coats in jewel-toned velvet and corduroy. The set was inspired by the hauntingly gorgeous "Leaving for Paris" by Rufus Wainwright, which never fails to captivate me each and every time I hear it. The original idea was to project an image of a train schedule onstage, to give the illusion of the piece taking place in a train station. The visuals didn't happen due to technical difficulties, but I think the idea came through fairly well in any case.
Here are some studio shots:
Here is a video from the balcony: (thanks Prince Pablo!)
And here is a shot of everyone, including a very sick, very tired, and very happy Stefbot:
Thanks to all my beautiful models and to Lance Fuller (also beautiful!) for bringing the pathos. :)
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:
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!!!
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.
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?
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.
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.
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!
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.
