Fengwen Guo

Excerpts from an Interview with the Designer

Recorded on: Feb 20 2023 and March 21 2023

Tell me about your collection!

My works in general, they’re usually quite conceptual, and have a sense of simplicity in it, because I love that sense of just having one focal point, and having a strong strike just by doing that. My collection would have three pairs of works, so six in total, and two as a set. They’re all built on the idea of misplacement or something being offset, and there’s a sense of an inappropriate amount of overgrowth in it. In my previous works with fabrics, I did alot of repetition on shirts and blazers, because I feel like shirts and blazers have that symbolism as a uniform, and there’s a sense of restraint in it. It feels like a straightjacket - I feel like suits and shirts are just that for the general public. You keep them in order, you keep them busy because everyone needs something to do, otherwise they’ll start thinking. And you need to prevent people from thinking to promote peace and order. That’s why I did a lot of shirts and blazers. And in my collection, there will be a broader sense in what I consider uniform or clothing in general. The first pair of work will just be a black sheet, presenting models. Using that as a starting point, I will shift the focus from the persons themselves to the relationship of the individual with their garment. So, the ones that follow the black sheets are two things that represent daily wear and their relationship with the wearer, in my perspective. And the last two works would imitate human forms with the shapes of hands, legs, in the colortone of skin, to imitate an overgrowth of the human body.  I'm also making shoes, hopefully three - one pair and one extra. All of them will be 3D printed. The whole collection will be a discussion from the bodies themselves, to the body’s relationship with the garment, and then back to the relationship of one's body to their own interpretation of their own body.

Has your use of color been a conscious decision for you, or has it come more naturally?

I think you can say it in both ways and it will still be correct. Because I really don't choose color based on how I like the way it looks. It's usually more that I need a reason to use certain colors. So, the six pieces, I have two pieces as a set. So I have three pairs of them. 

The first pair are just pitch black, because I wanted to show the models, the human bodies, instead of the garments. For the garments, I want them to be a minimalist background. It shouldn't hold any definition to it at all. So I try to use the color that, you know, absorbs all lights, which, you know, does not reflect or produce value in a certain sense. 

And then the second pair, which contains a large blazer, and then a deformed pair of jeans. For those two, I'm simply using blue denim for the jeans. And now I'm thinking gray wool for the blazer, simply because in my impression, those are two colors that are most common to these two objects. And I am trying to build a narrative about commonly used objects and the norms surrounding them.

What inspired the thinking/philosophy behind your collection? Was it anything specific?

I don’t think it was a really specific thing, but I guess I’m trying really hard to be a curious and aware person. I’m not saying I am, I’m just trying to be… and I think in that process it involves a lot of thinking. When I’m alone, I’ll just think about random stuff.