Architecture and Fashion

How Clothing and Buildings work together

Earlier this year, Andi Soos and I gave a talk at New York’s Center for Architecture where Andi showed off this image:

Isn’t that fantastic? It’s a dress designed by the brilliant poet and painter Joe Brainard, who notoriously loved playing with queerness in the depiction of “pansies.” Even though JW Anderson made a whole Loewe collection in Brainard’s honor, Brainard himself was not a fashion designer. This dress was a one-off project for the Skowhegan School, where artists of all disciplines were instructed to design costumes for an annual ball.

All the costumes that these artists designed were delightfully loopy. But Andi took a special shine to this one, designed by architect James Wines.

This would not be Wines’ only dalliance in fashion, however. He went on to design the flagship for the iconic designer Willi Smith and his brand WilliWear.

It was definitely a surprising aesthetic, but it was a way to add context to this early pioneer of streetwear by literally bringing the street inside.

Wines also designed the offices: there’s Willi behind his deconstructed desk.

This toppling structure was also seen in Wines’ designs for the (beautiful and doomed) retail chain BEST Department Stores. They were too good to last!

But architects work in/around fashion retail all the time. Take, as a superstar example, Frank Gehry’s design of the Issey Miyake store.

Andi and I wondered how fashion has influenced architecture, and vice versa. And so we had a really fun journey getting lost in the rabbit hole. Here is our conversation in full:

And by the way, if you watch this and wonder what Lehel Market Hall looks like- here it is. Sorry we forgot to include a picture of it.

Isn’t she lovely?