Based in Stockholm, Ellen Hodakova Larsson has built a practice around upcycling. She was invited to iterate on her popular belt bags by Gucci Vault, and when we met in Stockholm over the summer, the designer said her online Barbie capsule had generated a lot of interest. The ongoing influence of that doll is astonishing. Barbie, who represents an ideal of beauty, is a good precursor to Larsson’s spring collection, a meditation on perfection.
Ultimately the spring lineup was a refutation of the concept—perhaps unsurprisingly, since the designer works with materials that many would consider detritus straight off the bat. Selected with great care, her fabrics are found in warehouses, tag sales, and secondhand shops; as such, they don’t have the happy, shiny newness of something wrapped in plastic or right off the rack. Plus Larsson chooses to work with not only easily translatable finds, like suiting, but also slightly ickier ones: nylons and brassieres. Unlike Franco Moschino’s perky bra dress, the Hodakova version, which made a return for spring, had a hollowness more reminiscent of the sculptures of Louise Bourgeois. Those cups do not runneth over.
The designer specifically thought about the beauty ideal in this lineup. Her flower dresses were a reaction to filters and body modifications that seek to trap youth in amber. In response, Larsson said she “captured beauty—beauty that actually ages.” A dried flower might not have the same allure as a fresh-cut one, “but it still has a beauty.” These flora were preserved in silicone and individually, lovingly, hand-sewn onto linen.
Larsson used lipstick this season as a metaphor for “perfection and desire,” she said. The counterpart to those tubes of rouge were ink-filled ballpoint pens. (Every season the designer chooses one standout item to work with: spoons, watch cases, vintage letters, buttons….) The idea here was to encourage people to write their own stories, specifically to rely on words versus images to find new ways forward. Larsson constantly plays surface against substance. Found materials and garments come with built-in stories that she edits to create new tales. One of the ways she does this is by turning things upside down (see the tailored set with waistband hems, Look 1) and inside out (Look 20). She also twists and displaces. The way Larsson torqued the deconstructed jacket in Look 21 captured gesture. The louche volumes of her multi-pant skirts never fail to delight. Here their voluptuousness was countered by the many pieces that made use of multiple waistbands, which Larsson associates with restriction. And rightly so: A woman’s waist measurement is often used as a sort of valuation.
This collection included many greatest hits, all thoughtfully considered. The plastic used for the finale dress was repurposed from last season’s version, for example. New for the season was menswear, which, though twisted, had a classical feel, as did a lovely dress made of vintage tablecloths that was an actual pillar of minimalism. It was a sartorial equivalent of a blank page, much like a white shirt can be. A plain button-down paired with a spiky pencil skirt took on a kind of note-to-self function, showing the audience that these special pieces can be grounded with wardrobe staples.
