Photo © Maxime Ballesteros
“The fashion industry is a paradoxical and complex world. Overproduction and consumption, narrow ideals of beauty and environmental damage are just a few of the sore points that should concern us,” says Merel van Glabbeek, a 25-year-old fashion design graduate from Amsterdam’s Fashion Institute. We were sitting at her Uncle’s architect studio where she has set up shop for the day’s shoot as part of our ongoing journey to discover new fashion and art talent. That attitude towards fashion might comes as a surprise: as the daughter of a seamstress, van Glabbeek grew up learning the language of fashion to express herself – even if using fashion to express one’s strife with it might seem contradicting. “Narrow beauty ideals are the reason most people feel ashamed. Clothing is there to cover up what you don’t want to show yet in Ancient Greece clothing was used to idealize the body. It was more important than functionality.” Glabbeek honed in on Ancient Greece for her graduate collection, as her scrapbook filled with ancient sculptures proves.The core of her collection was the subject of shame and how clothes simultaneously cover and create shame. What did find out? “I don’t think being shameless exists.”
Read more about Merel Van Glabbeek Sleek’s trip from Berlin to London via Amsterdam and Antwerp in the next issue of Sleek, publishing next month. Find out more information on The Search at mb! by Mercedes-Benz.