WDKA Graduation 2024

It’s Graduation-time! Today a a selection of the Graduation-show of WDKA, the Willem de Kooning Academy in Rotterdam. This year 20 fashion-students presented their final collection, two of them had a digital presentation. You won’t find them here.

Faima Karimi

Simone Kraaijenveld

Philipp Merx

Phasika Jaroensaen

Kirsten van Ieperen

Beyza Demirci

Bent Lochtenberg

Charlotte Peters

Thijs Wolff

Sara Kreeft

Sophie Emaus

Eva Borro

Bezzi Bae

Alissa Barkley

Aaisha Kodapanakkal

Christy Millarson

Alex Holdorp

Salome Jeanne

Peter Stigter aan de Muur at Margreeth Olsthoorn

Until january 12th 2011 the designer store of Margreeth Olsthoorn in Rotterdam presents some wonderful and special fashion-photos of Peter Stigter aan de Muur, the charity-project of Peter Stigter. While you are looking for some great items on sale in the store (the lovely Margreeth Olsthoorn sells Margiela, Chalayan, Vibskov, Klavers van Engelen, Spijkers & Spijkers and Acne) you can pop in to pictures of Jean Paul Gaultier’s Madonna’s, Alexander McQueen, John Galliano and Givenchy. Margreeth Olsthoorn already fell in love with the Finale of Sonia Rykiels anniversary-show, the photo that’s presented behind her desk.

Margreeth Olsthoorn, Witte de Withstraat 5, Rotterdam

Graduation shows: WDKA – Rotterdam

As the end of the school year is approaching all fashion academies are presenting their graduation collections. Yesterday it was the Willem De Kooning Academy in Rotterdam who showed us the work of their graduation students. The Schiecentrale was their show area, a good choice, cause it all felt very professional.

After a few second and third year students showed off their designing skills, it was time to shine for thirteen fourth year students.

One thing that struck us was the great choice of colors. The students, independently of each other chose the most oustanding colors. Many shades that are in fashion now, like camel, peach, lilac and turquoise, were mixed & matched into wonderful eye-catching outfits.

The show started off with several design by Evalien van Gemeren, named Eva. She came up with colorful prints, which she called self-developed hieroglyphs. Overall her designs had a quite wide silhouette and came across as a bit manly.

Musa Shah presented a men’s collection, called Connected intimacy. Although…manly….. His fabrics were thin, transparent and shiny and thus gave the outfits a very soft touch. Some people will love it and some will hate it. But the truth is, Musa’s clothes were all very well made.

One of the collections that would probably sell very well was that of Ruby Verhoeven. She presented a classical and very wearable collection. Ruby played with the details of her clothes, like the pockets and zippers. They all appeared to be something different than what they looked like. Her fabrics were thin and feminine and the colors of the designs looked great together, especially with the blue shoes the models wore.

The collection of Anke de Vor, named TriBe, showed – again – a wonderful color palette. Peach, lilac and terracotta for example. Anke used a great print and also mixed jute with cotton for her imagine tribe. The clothes were based on those of neo-hippies. And for one of the designs (a peach-colored mix between a jumpsuit and harem pants) we sure could tell comfort and movement were important aspects in this collection.

Noortje Zijlstra’s collection caught our attention, while it was remarkable, yet not very wearable. The serie of dresses, named Meisjes met baarden existed of several dresses attached to the models’ faces by a small wire or threads, like a beard. The idea was fun, yet it made the actual clothes fade into the background.

The last collection we would like to mention was Zoot me if you can, by Mandy Minkman. Not only were her men’s clothes very well-made, we loved the whole concept behind it too. Mandy was inspired by the Zoot-suit from the late 30’s, mostly worn by jazz-musicians. This was visible through the great pants she designed with outstanding proportions.

We’re very curious about what we’re going to hear from these students in the future. But so far it looks very promising…

The Art of Fashion & Peter Stigter

The fading boundaries between art and fashion were the starting point for the Art of Fashion exhibition in museum Boymans van Beuningen in Rotterdam, Five international designers were asked to design an item for this exhibition in which art and fashion were brought together. Although fashion sometimes seems superficial, it is more than wearing the right colour or skirt length. Fashion is a reflection of society and times we’re living in. Fashion is nowadays often even a form of art, and they both influence each other.
Viktor & Rolf, Naomi Filmer, Hussein Chalayan, Walter van Beirendonck and Anna-Nicole Ziesche all put the idea of a wearable collection aside, used their imagination and came up with various designs. These five designers were chosen  because they all were already exploring the boundaries of fashion in their own designs. Viktor & Rolf, for example, used a model wearing her own light and music installation for their a/w 07-08 fashion show. According to Jose Teunissen, the conservator,  this particular design is a perfect example and  therefore iconic for the whole exhibition. That’s also the reason why the museum decided to use Peter Stigter’s catwalkimage of this particular model to promote the Art of Fashion exhibition in the Netherlands. (Tess van Daelen)

The Art of Fashion, from 19/09/09 – 10-01-10 at  Booijmans van Beuningen Museum Rotterdam.

Graduationshows 2009, #2 Rotterdam

The location for the graduationshow of Willem de Kooning Academy was typical Rotterdam: the Schiecentrale in trendy Lloyd-district. Raw, industrial, full of energy. The collections also represented that atmosphere, with focus on construction, shape and neutral colors.