Dame Zandra Rhodes is probably one of the most iconic and recognisable
fashion designers in the UK, not only for her bright pink hair, but also
for her free-spirited take on colour and pattern, and the Fashion and
Textile Museum is celebrating her five decades in fashion with a
retrospective exhibition dedicated to her fascinating career.
“The dresses tell the story of Zandra,” explains Dennis Nothduff, head
of exhibitions at the Fashion and Textile Museum on a press tour of the
‘Zandra Rhodes: 50 Years of Fabulous’ exhibition, which features a dress
from each year of Rhodes’s career, the first dates back to 1969, an
ankle-length, screen-printed kaftan, while the most recent is from the
Jubilee collection, designed in 2019 to mark her 50th anniversary.
Nothduff added: “This is not quite a retrospective, as we are
celebrating Zandra’s collections, while also looking to the future.”
Opening to the public on September 27, the exhibition marks the
largest-ever dedicated to Rhodes, and features not only her incredible
designs, including pieces from her iconic 1976-77’s influential,
punk-inspired ‘Conceptual Chic’, the 1978’s ‘Star Wars’ collection and her
highly-successful archive collection for Matches Fashion in 2016, it also
delves into her unique process of making textiles, her take on opera
costumes, a look inside her sketchbooks, which apparently she is never far
away from, as well as how she got started in fashion.
It is also fitting that the exhibition is taking place at the Fashion
and Textile Museum, as Rhodes herself founded the space in 2003 to not only
showcase a programme of changing exhibitions exploring elements of fashion
and textiles but to also inspire a new generation of creatives, with the
museum becoming a hub of ideas, networking and learning for the industry.
British designer Zandra Rhodes celebrated with retrospective exhibition
The main gallery space has been reimagined in Rhodes’ style, with the
feature walls dripping in the designer’s classic gold, reminiscent of her
iconic lamé gowns, which can be seen within the central, multi-tiered
plinth that features more than thirty ensembles against a backdrop of pink
and red, whilst individual golden plinths highlight signature pieces
against walls hung with chiffons, the fabrication that Rhodes has made her
own.
Once you’ve weaved through the years on the ground floor admiring
Rhodes’ gorgeous prints, from her 70’s ‘Giant Smail Flower’ design to her
iconic ‘Button Flower’ and ‘Chinese Squares’ from the 1980s, the dress worn
by Princess Diana, the 2018 fan pleated jumpsuit in a dramatic shimmer
satin, her first sari as part of her collaboration with Indian craftsmen
and artisans, and her pieces dedicated to New York featuring the Manhattan
skyline, you then head upstairs to what the designer has called her “forest
of chiffons”.
The Mezzanine Gallery is dedicated to her textiles, the process of
making her prints and dresses, and features over thirty hand-designed,
screen-printed textiles that hang in rows, filling the space from floor to
ceiling and allowing visitors to wend their way between original versions
of some of the designer’s most iconic prints from throughout her career.
Here, you get to see some of her most iconic prints, including the
‘Mexican’ collection featuring sombreros and the ‘Indian Feathers’ design,
as well as learn about the unique process that Rhodes uses to create her
incredible dresses.
Across the gallery, The Magic Flute costumes Rhodes designed for The
English National Opera’s production of Aida, co-produced with Houston Grand
Opera and San Francisco Opera, are on display, which Rhodes explained was a
“challenge, but I like making someone who is a size 18 feel like a fairy
princess,” during the press tour.
These are displayed alongside Rhodes’ celebrity designs, including a
replicate of a pleated top she made for Freddie Mercury, which was used in
the Bohemian Rhapsody movie, and a sample of the dress she created for
singer Barbra Streisand worn at her London concert earlier this year.
The final stop on the exhibition is within The Fashion Studio, where a
collection of Rhodes’s sketchbooks, alongside larger than life
reproductions of her illustrations, are on display. Rhodes is famous for
having a drawing a day rule, and rare examples of her daily life in
sketches can be seen for the first time, offering a new insight into her
design process that has remained largely unchanged across the last fifty
years.
Other highlights of the exhibition includes her 1972’s ‘Shell
Collection’ silk chiffon gown, still produced today for Matches, examples
of her 1981’s ‘Gold Renaissance’ collection, looks from which are currently
featured in the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s exhibition Camp: Notes on
Fashion, as well the now-iconic quilted ‘calico coat’ from the 1969’s
‘Ukraine and Chevron Shawl’ collection.
Zandra Rhodes: 50 Years of Fabulous will run at the Fashion and Textile
Museum from September 27 to January 26, 2020.
Images: by Danielle Wightman-Stone
