About Me
Hi, I’m Lewis a final year student at DMU specialising in knitwear
From a young age I have always had an interested in fashion, fabrics and creative arts. I specialised in fine art and sculpture before finding my excitement within fashion design. After exploring a range of media, I grew very fond of knitwear and the craftsmanship within making a fabric into a garment
After taking a year out to understand the business and marketing side of the industry, I gained a large amount of experience working as a floor supervisor in luxury retail, I understood how the fashion market works through brand packs/Segmentation. Coming back to complete my final year of studies this was useful to help aid construction of my garments and the marketing side of my work
INSPIRATION
My experience of queer hate
Exploring slurs and discriminatory phrases that I have been called throughout my life, I wanted to put a positive twist on these and play with them through my vision of camp. My ideas of camp is by taking ideas and concepts associated with a masculine background or setting and subverting them with feminine ideas and techniques. This lead me to take these masculine associated garments and pairing them with lace and sculptural knit techniques
This project helped me explore my own queer identity and become comfortable with my sexuality and identity. Along with my idea of camp and the use of slurs, I wanted to bring close attention to queer history from the UK and the US to acknowledge the difficulty they struggled with through the 80s AID’S epidemic and the hate they suffered. I believe it’s incredibly significant to look to the past to help pave the way for a better future
MY WORK
PORTFOLIOS
He’s a what? Exploring queer iconography and slurs
Queer heritage
Gay as a sailor
Re-imagining the 1940s sailor uniform
Technical drawings of the corset and vest
Taking the vest and exploring the silhouette
Photographed by Dnee Scott
Exploring the 60’s biker jacket
Photographed by Dnee Scott
DETAIL
The pansy
Taking one of the slurs I was called the most as a child was “Your such a pansy”. Rather than concealing this I wanted to create a bold colour palette that takes ownerships of one of these phrases from my childhood. Now I hear these slurs and see them in a more positive. Whilst looking through photography from the 80’s, I felt a disconnection from the colour and the emotion from these images and wanted to bring colour into a time where hate against queer people was stronger
My desire is to preserve the sense of people’s lives, to endow them with the strength and beauty I see in them. I want the people in my pictures to stare back- nan Goldin
Graduate Fashion Week in partnership with:
