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Raw Elegance
Photography by Chloe Mallett
Fashion Direction and interview by Ursula Lake
Make has a chat with designer Bora Aksu to find out how his ethereal designs come to life.
Q. Can you tell us a little bit about your childhood, growing up in Turkey, your background and your route into design?
A. The whole starting point for fashion to me was the raw drawing ability that I had when I was a child. I find drawing a highly sensitive way to open doors to my imaginary world. I always had a secret admiration of fashion and had also observed it from a young age.
This was way before I even knew what fashion stood for. I grew up in a family of doctors, my mother, my father, my uncles and my cousins are all doctors. Growing up in a family of doctors and loving art and drawings was not easy. My parents were worried that I spent all my time drawing so at one point I was banned from doing drawings my parents put my older brother in charge so whenever I started a new drawing my brother picked the paper from my hand and gave it to my parents. This was, of course, very frustrating for me as a child but also It made me more obsessed with drawings than before. The main subjects of my sketches were my mum and my auntie. Most of my drawings from childhood represent their fashion sense: their clothes, their hairstyles and shoes.
When I became a teenager, my drawings became more like fashion sketches. Painting, illustrating and drawing was the initial step before I got into fashion. When I was little, I created my own world by drawing for days and days and girls with big eyes somehow reflected my childhood. I think the whole concept of taking fashion as a career choice came to me when I realised that fashion is much more to me than just drawings, fabrics or clothes. I had a revelation, discovering the link between my 2D drawings to then creating 3D garments. This realisation was magically transformative for me and my life.
My aim as a designer is to create my own definition of beauty. For me, the female form is the most important tool. I am an incurable romantic and my aim as a designer is to seek and define beauty on my own terms. My design aesthetic fuses a romantic sensibility with raw elegance. Delicately textured fabrics and whimsical detailing are underpinned by a distinctive twist on tailoring. I like to use decorative shapes and a translucent use of colour. ‘There is an imperfection to my work which creates purity and beauty. Fashion design for me is a visual language that enables me to communicate with the outside world.
Q. To us, there always feels that there is a story or a narrative that you would like to convey in your collections, does this idea ring true to you?
A. I do like telling stories through collections. And people have the most inspiring stories. For me, the collection development really makes sense if it is based on a story. The fabrics, textures or contrasts within the collection become a representation of certain elements of the story. I have always been drawn to fragile and slightly broken characters. That despite their frailties still have the determination and strength to stand against traditional restrictions. Every season, I search for these heroines and try to dig into their lives to find out their struggles and their strength. And of course, the obstacles they faced purely because of their gender still amazes me. I have deep admiration for these characters, especially how they push through life and how they refused to be shamed by society.
Q. How do you start and progress through your creative design process? Does it start with a story, image, place etc?
A. When it comes to an inspiration source, I don’t put any boundaries around it. Anything or anyone can be an inspiration to me. It’s usually a big pot of ideas. As soon as an idea comes to mind, I like to sketch it out. My process of putting together a collection is through many layers. You can have an initial inspiration, it’s never just one thing. For me, it’s not so much about what sources have inspired me, but more about how I then use them and make them my own.
I always look into my childhood memories and focus on something that is very personal to me. Some of the collections have had a more cultural edge. Some seasons I have done a lot of research and trips and used a lot of visual references. Fabric choice always influences my designs. The drape, texture, and colour are all helpful in moulding my ideas. Then the designs are generally altered and manipulated by additional draping. Each fabric works differently under the needle, each pleat or ruffle falls a certain way depending on how you drape it on the dress form. For me, the ability to cut the cloth to produce abstract and complex shapes brought to life through experimentation and imagination is what my design language is based on. My ability to drape cloth, at times directly on a person, also resulted in accidental design ideas, which is at the heart of some of my most important work. Fabric becomes very important in the process of translating ideas into actual garments.
Q. Do you have a muse or a dream ideal of the woman that you design for?
A. Muses are so important for me as I always start building a collection around a character. I do choose muses that usually don’t fit in their society or in their historical timeline or sometimes I choose muses that are overlooked heroines of their time.
My mum was and still is a huge inspiration source for me. Not just as a strong woman who always wanted to stand on her feet and pursued a difficult carrier to create a life for herself, but also as an amazing creative human being. I am sure my mum’s fashion sense implanted something bigger in me. She always was very creative but this was mostly hidden behind her doctor identity. Even though she was a very hard-working mother, she also had a strong vision of how her style should be. She was never satisfied with the styles that the stores of the time were selling so instead of getting frustrated, she decided to create outfits for herself. She learned how to knit and created amazing skirts and dresses for herself. When I look through our family albums, I could see how stylish my mum was and I think when I was growing up my first initial fashion ideas came through her.
Q. Do you feel that coming from Turkey has an influence on the aesthetic or mood of the brand?
A. I grew up in Izmir with my family. Sometimes the inspiration sources in regards to my family are more visible in the end design and sometimes it’s more hidden. Whether it’s the past or the present, all my ideas come from what’s going on around me: from friends, culture, memories or movies. I think my first initial fashion ideas came from the people around me. My family, my mum, through observing their attitudes, and the way they dress, I wanted to capture it.
When I was growing up In Turkey in every household there will be someone with amazing handcraft skills. It could be crochet, needlework, knitting or weaving. So, growing up, I was surrounded by all these crafts. My auntie and my grandma were always creating amazing hand crochets and lace garments as a hobby. I also spent three months travelling through different villages and towns in the Aegean region, it was a way of getting to know the Turkish culture in a totally different way.
Q. Ethical practices and sustainability are now essential to modern fashion. How do you incorporate sustainability into your designs?
A. I feel like we are in a time when we all need to be more kind, considerate and less consuming. It was always very important to be sustainable and even more so now. It’s not just about protecting the sources around us now but also being able to leave a better world for future generations. For the last few seasons, I’ve searched for fabrics that are not newly produced or polished. Instead, I asked to see the fabrics stuck in the back rooms of manufacturers due to their discolouring, or aged appearance. These once rejected fabrics became the main fabrics in the most elaborate garments. Instead of hiding their defects, I displayed them in their full glory in the collection showing that beauty does come in any form. The idea of not consuming more and reusing the sources and fabrics already around us is really key in my design process.
Q. We hear that you are something of an artist and painter in your spare time. Do you have a favourite piece of art that you would love to own and can you tell us why?
A. Yes, I am! Illustrations are very personal to me, and I always feel a sense of freedom when drawing. For me, fashion and art have such a sensitive relationship, but the connection between the two has evolved very naturally for me since I was a child. I would of course love to own a piece by Gustav Klimt or one of Henry Darger’s illustrations. Both artists have been a huge inspiration source for me.
Q. We are fascinated by how designers coped during the pandemic because it was such a hard time for true fashion design. Can you tell us your pandemic story and anything you learned from it?
A. I personally thought in times like these the worst thing we could do is to stop creating. For me being creative is one of the only tools we have to bring hope.
The first collection I designed during the pandemic was based on the 1918 pandemic. I thought the only way to understand this is to look into history to see if the world faced similar situations in the past. During this time people tried to simplify their life using their survival instinct and so comfort and flexibility became the main driving force in their choices. After the pandemic, the world went through a sense of relief and freedom which reflects in the collection styles in terms of colour and shapes. We felt it was important to still show this collection, even with a very reduced audience. We also set up our global online store during the pandemic which was very challenging. But it was the right thing to do and it’s proven to be fruitful after.
Q. What are your plans or hopes for the future of the brand?
A. In 2015 we started the retail operation, and we opened our first Bora Aksu store in Hong Kong, we now have 64 stores. The retail experience gave me a new insight into my design philosophy as through the stores we meet with our actual customers directly. During the pandemic, we changed ways and gained an audience through our online store.
Now the stores have reopened and customers are shopping again, I realise more and more that the customers want to see a personal touch and make a connection when they walk into the store, more than ever before. We are now creating stores that have wall designs which include my sketches, hand-painted mannequins or illustrated hangers. I am trying to keep my collections very personal as well. The hand craft items somehow bring that personal touch in a very effortless way. I do hope that I will be able to carry on doing what I love doing in the future. This is the biggest blessing of all.
Q. The theme of this issue is ‘Hope’. What are you hopeful for right now?
A. It’s the greatest title, as we all need hope right now. I wanted to bring hope and encouragement into the times we live in and move into a better world, I think that finding a better world can only happen when we discover our better selves. I believe fashion is focusing more on individuality, I think it will be about people, their individual style and their personality. I think that trends will not be dominating fashion as they will be irrelevant. Every individual will create their own trends and follow them.
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu
To find out more about the collection visit www.boraaksu.com
Model: Astral at M&P
Hair by Craig Taylor at One Represents & Haris Hairdressers
Make-up Sonia Deveney @soniadeveney.com using Clarins
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu
All clothes and accessories by Bora Aksu