Photography by Robin Kater.
Pauline Dujancourt calls me in the evening, a couple of hours after the debut of her Spring Summer 2023 collection. She’s lying in bed, telling me about how it went. “It’s all been very very hectic, and tomorrow will probably be very busy too,” the French fashion designer says, laughing. “This was the first time I’ve ever done this, all by myself.”
Titled “Dysfunctional Beauty: Chapter II,” Dujancourt’s latest offering is a continuation of her final MA collection from earlier this year at Central Saint Martins. Twisted drapes and distressed tailoring are married with hand-knitted, crochet techniques; metallic Japanese yarn is delicately stitched with contrasting fabrics, openings are ripped into the fabric to create – what Dujancourt likes to coin – “happy accidents” – a technique which she has now integrated as a signature look in her designs. “I think it actually looks more special,” she says. “Because the more I mend the piece of the work, the more of it I’m bringing to life.”
Whilst her MA collection was more focused on the garments made by women in East Germany during the German Democratic Republic of the mid-twentieth century, Dujancourt’’s latest collection exemplifies this notion of hindered creativity – of building up an object with just the basic tools lying in front of you. “I think the fact you can work with such a minimalist approach of taking two needles and a bundle of yarn and paper – it’s so simple and takes nothing, but if you have the skills and patience, and if you have nothing, you can create everything.”
Photography by Robin Kater.
Dujancourt tells me she has a book in her hand, with a particular excerpt which she wants to read out. Taken from the book Letters to a Young Poet, she describes how the poet, Rainer Maria Rilke, informed her work with his words:
“And even if you were in some prison, the walls of which led none of the sounds of the world come to your sense (…) go into yourself, test the depths in which your life takes rise and as its source you will find the answer to the question whether you must create.”
“I find it so beautiful – if you’re locked by yourself between those four walls, and you barely have anything, you still have your inner world and creativity,” Dujancourt says. “You shouldn’t need all this machinery and you should be able to be creative and to share your vision, no matter what you have.”
Dujancourt parallels the covid social restrictions to her ideologies surrounding the power of simplicity – something she experienced whilst studying MA Womenswear Fashion at Central Saint Martins over the last few years. “I’m so glad I did my MA during this specific time,” she affirms. “It meant that I didn’t need tons of things to complete it. If I’m left with any sort of limitation, it makes me think, how much can I do? If you’re meant to create some garments in your tiny five square metres of your flat share with no machinery – are you going to be stuck and complain, or are you going to come up with something even more exciting than before?”
Photography by Robin Kater.
It’s evident that there is a feeling of poetic continuity that permeates Dujancourt’s work. A feeling that everything – from her lookbooks to her showroom collections – exists in a single burst of language. Together they interweave a whimsical dreamscape, where a journey across East Germany during the dictatorship, a dress spun in yarn from Japan, the poetry of Rainer Maria Rilke, inhabit the same world.
Each of these explorations are bound together by Dujancourt’s quest to embody soul into her clothing. “I feel like when it comes to using a sewing machine, it removes any human touch, and it can look quite flat. If it’s made my hand, the person is going to wear a piece which has been worked on for 80 hours – that’s so special!” Dujancourt says. “I love the idea that it’s like a sculptor who is preparing their own clay, and then they go on to make their whole process from scratch. I want my pieces to be special to the people who wear them.”
Credits
Fashion: Pauline Dujancourt
Photography: Robin Kater
Model: Leonie
Beauty: Victoria Reuter