L.A. Fashion Week Spring '08: Gary Harvey
Gary Harvey’s twin muses are the beauty of a woman’s torsohellip;and garbage. He mixed the two to create a high fashion–inspired collection that would delight people and make them think. The English designer made his American debut Oct. 13 at the EcoNouveau fashion and music event at BoxEight, held at Vibiana in downtown Los Angeles.
Harvey’s runway show featured more than 24 pieces. The most provocative pieces included a ball gown constructed out of Financial Times newspapers. Another was made out of discarded baseball jackets. Brides might take notice of his wedding dress, which was built from a dozen used wedding dresses.
The dramatic form of the corset, which brings out the form of a woman’s torso, was the first step in designing the dresses, Harvey said. The next step was merely researching what people throw out. One of Harvey’s points was to provoke his audience into thinking about the clothes that they deem garbage. Probably another point for Harvey, a former design chief for the European divisions of Levi’s and Docker’s, was to see where his imagination could take him. —Andrew Asch
