Designer Profile - Julian Roberts
"This is my teaching method. I call it "Subtraction Cutting", but its more an approach to design that is relaxed & impulsive. Subtraction Cutting is DESIGNING WITH PATTERNS, rather than creating patterns for designs. I don't want to be limited by a design prior to cutting.
Pattern cutting to me is a physical activity, and I see garments as fluid, in transit, constantly moving, asymmetrical, and far more expressive than a static floor plan or technical drawing. I work fast in order to soak some adrenalin & emotion into the cloth I'm manipulating, allowing my moods & preferences to shape the resulting garment. I mix & crossover different perspectives when I cut patterns, and try to lose track of the finished outcome in the twists & turns of the patterns geometry.
Sometimes I am thinking of a garment from a frontal view, & sometimes I am hovering above it from an aerial view looking down. I sometimes cut from the inside of the garment outwards, from back to front, or upside down, or my patterns sometimes represent the hollow space within the garment that the body occupies, rather than the positive space that IS the garment.
My patterns go both with & against the grain of the fabric, they question why a glove should look like a hand, or why a triangular block can only fit into a triangular shaped hole. Fabric is not like wood, concrete or cardboard, and designing in cloth requires a fluid way of thinking that isn't stiffened or restrained by inflexible rules & traditions.
I love the traditional methods, and I also love to tear them apart & ignore them. There is no right or wrong way to cut a garment & nobody is in control of fashion. If you change the variables, twist to a new perspective, use freehand lines that aren't obvious or human in shape, present your work in challenging new formats, then you don't know 100% what the results will be, and you allow yourself to be shocked, surprised or disappointed at the very last moment, as the garment rises from a 2-dimensional level, upwards into a 3-dimensional object & outward into the dimensionless world of fashion image and style."
Julian will thoroughly explain his concepts and give instructions for using his techniques in clothing design. He begins with a large piece of cloth and moves through each step of the process, using many models and examples along the way.
Julian has shown many collections at London's Fashion Week in addition to being a film maker for SuperSuper Magazine and a consultant to the BBC. Currently, he develops his own collections, designing both the form and the engineered surface designs. His film/web/graphics company, JULIANAND, is a leader in defining the visual identity of this century.
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