Gareth Pugh

Infobox Fashion Designer


caption=Gareth Pugh, May 2007.
name=Gareth Pugh
nationality=English
birth_date=August 31, 1981 [http://education.guardian.co.uk/egweekly/story/0,,2191528,00.html College days | eG weekly | EducationGuardian.co.uk ] ]
birth_place=Sunderland, England
death_date=
death_place=
education=City of Sunderland College, Central Saint Martins
label_name=Gareth Pugh
significant_design=
awards=|

Gareth Pugh (born August 31, 1981) is an English fashion designer. [http://showstudio.com/contributors/4252 "Gareth Pugh: Fashion Designer."] Showstudio.com. Accessed Apr. 9, 2007.] West, Daniel. [http://www.iconeye.com/articles/20070327_10 "Gareth Pugh."] Icon Magazine (December 2006). Accessed Apr. 9, 2007.] He currently lives and works in Paris.

Career

At 14, Pugh began working as a costume designer for the English National Youth Theatre. He started his fashion education at City of Sunderland College and finished his degree in Fashion Design at Central Saint Martins in 2003. His final collection at St. Martins, which used balloons to accentuate models' joints and limbs (a technique that would become one of his trademarks), attracted that attention of the senior fashion editor of "Dazed & Confused" magazine, who placed one of his designs on the magazine's cover shortly thereafter. Pugh was selected to participate in British reality show "The Fashion House" two months after his graduation, which he would later call "horrible" and his "only other option [to being on] the dole." The rise of !WOWOW!, a feature in "Dazed & Confused", and a debut show at London club Kashpoint's Alternative Fashion Week brought Pugh to the attention of Fashion East "London's breeding ground for cutting-edge new talent," leading them to invite Pugh to participate in its Autumn 2005 group show. [ [http://www.vogue.co.uk/shows/photos/Default.aspx?ShowID=2219 "Fashion East - Pugh."] Vogue.co.uk.] Pugh had only four weeks, with no studio, no assistants, and little money, to create the collection. His collection ended up a critical success and attracted significant attention to his designs.

Pugh's solo premiere was in London's Fall 2006 fashion week; he has since showed his Spring 2007 and Autumn 2007 collections there.Mower, Sarah. style.com|id=pugh|season=fall|year=2006|type=review (Feb. 15, 2006). Accessed Apr. 9, 2007.] Mower, Sarah. style.com|id=pugh|season=spring|year=2007|type=review (Sept. 19, 2006). Accessed Apr. 9, 2007.] Mower, Sarah. style.com|id=pugh|season=fall|year=2007|type=review (Feb. 15, 2007). Accessed Apr. 9, 2007.] Pugh's shows have continued to draw critical praise. British "Vogue", for instance, called his Spring 2007 collection "an incredible, unmissable show" and said that "his genius is undeniable."Jones, Dolly. [http://www.vogue.co.uk/Shows/Reports/Default.aspx?stID=38726 "Gareth Pugh Spring/Summer 2007."] Vogue.co.uk (Sept. 19, 2006). Accessed Apr. 9, 2007.] Anna Wintour is a notable supporter of Pugh's designs.

Kylie Minogue has used many of Pugh's designs over the recent years, most famously in her Showgirl - The Greatest Hits Tour and Showgirl - The Homecoming Tour and Róisín Murphy recently appeared flamboyantly sporting one of Pugh's distinctive outfits in the videoclip promoting her 2007 album Overpowered [http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=VlFjf1pWk2c] , and on the cover of her single Let Me Know. Minogue has been seen wearing the same dress in her 2008 video for her single In My Arms.

Aesthetic

Style.com describes Pugh as the "latest addition to a long tradition of fashion-as-performance-art that stretches back through Alexander McQueen, John Galliano, and Vivienne Westwood to the eighties club culture of Leigh Bowery." (Pugh, however, dismisses frequent Bowery comparisons as "lazy journalism.") Pugh's collections are autobiographical rather than referential, and draw inspiration from Britain's extreme club scene. Pugh's trademark is his experimentation with form and volume. He often uses "nonsensically shaped, wearable sculptures" to "distort [] the human body almost beyond recognition." Elements in his designs include PVC inflated into voluminous coats, black and white patchwork squares, Perspex discs linked like chain mail, and shiny latex masks and leggings; [http://www.londonfashionweek.co.uk/designers/rooms/info/?id=2494&letters=2&from=rooms "Gareth Pugh."] Londonfashionweek.co.uk. Accessed Apr. 9, 2007.] he has used materials including mink, parachute silk, foam footballs, afro-weave synthetic hair, and electrically charged plastic in his clothing. Pugh describes his designs as being "about the struggle between lightness and darkness."

Commercial potential

Though he is currently a darling of the fashion elite, Pugh claimed in March 2007 that he had yet to sell a single dress and that he struggled to make ends meet. [Roe, Louise. [http://vogue.co.uk/vogue_daily/story/story.asp?stid=43618&date=&sid= "Hard Times."] Vogue.co.uk (Mar. 19 2007). Accessed Apr. 9, 2007.] (Until his Spring 2007 collection, his clothes were solely catwalk experiments and simply unavailable to purchase.) While constructing his autumn 2005 debut collection, shown in the Fashion East group show, he was squatting in a converted warehouse.Crompton, Erica. [http://www.hintmag.com/supernova/supernova_garethpugh.php "Supernova: Hint seeks out rising stars of design."] Hint Magazine (Aug. 2005). Accessed Apr. 9, 2007.] (A court order ultimately forced him to leave the building.) He says his current studio is unheated and has only two electrical outlets. It remains to be seen whether Pugh can be a commercial success as well as a critical one, but he is slowly shifting to more wearable clothing in his runway showsJones, Dolly. [http://www.vogue.co.uk/Shows/Reports/Default.aspx?stID=42812 "Gareth Pugh Fall/Winter 2007."] Vogue.co.uk (Feb. 15, 2007). Accessed Apr. 9, 2007.] and he has partnered with major manufacturers to produce some of his new pieces.

References

External links

* http://www.garethpugh.net/ - Official site.
*
* http://www.showstudio.com/projects/fashoff/ - Biographical films, performance films, catwalk shows.
* cite web |publisher= Victoria and Albert Museum
url= http://www.vam.ac.uk/collections/fashion/fashion_motion/gareth_pugh/index.html
title= Gareth Pugh Fashion Show at the V&A, June 2007
work=Fashion, Jewellery & Accessories
accessdate= 2007-08-05