about FASHION
As soon as I was allowed to touch a needle to start sewing, I did. I was old enough to walk in this handstitched knee-long skirt, but with its length of not even 30 cm, too young for school.
Later as music became more pop and electro, of course, our fashion had to follow and we added painting, dying, strass, and sequins.
A black plastic bag with KØBENHAVN printed on it became my initial print stitched at the sleeve of a fully sewn jacket and started my switch from manual to electric sewing machines. The jacket just got ready for my high school diploma.
Meeting Swedish fashion designer Margareta Forslund during my 2-month internship was either the most influential encounter for my work or her fashion was very much in line with my upcoming style. Margareta knew how to make raincoats into a chic and far more wearable piece of clothing than in yellow, with rubber boots and only in the rain. For this, she used simple yet refined patterns, colors, screen prints, shiny and matt materials, and generous cuts, and produced all of this in a small factory on her farm.
I took all this with me to college, and my professors at the art and design school taught watching, seeing, painting, scientific study, shapes, thinking, and understanding. After five years we could show all our improvement and personality in a diploma collection which I dedicated to men by dressing 12 of them in wide casual trousers, loose shirts with curved seams, and some jackets.
I kept sewing, it always starts by making my own patterns, it remains casual and feels sportive yet elegant.
They take part in everyday life, in that of others, and in mine.
about FOOTWEAR
It was in the shoe museum in Weissenfels where I explored on creaking floorboards and in huge old halls the history of shoes. Leather, fur, straw, and straps that were once tied around the feet were given closure methods, fits, functionality, decoration, symbolism, and status - all of this in its extremes.
And then there were these simple, red patented pumps from Sergio Rossi that sparked my passion for shoe design. I was blown away by their simplicity and beauty. Black and white photos showing cobblers in Budapest gave me the idea to go there and learn the craft.
But it became London for study, LOBB for bespoke shoemaking, and then Budapest when I started my first job as a shoe designer and developer for s`Oliver. They had a huge production site in Hungary where I enjoyed the atmosphere of door-on-door development with the departments of design, patternmaking, a workshop, and the production site.
Soonly the development went to Taiwan and shortly thereafter China, where I then turned in huge amounts of designs on lasts and received masses of impressively crafted and almost perfect samples in return.
Three years later I moved to Hamburg, from s`Oliver to Belmondo, from production in the Far East to Italy and Spain, from large product sites to small workshops, from synthetics to leather, and from a company under the roof of a design brand to a sales company - the house of Görtz.
After another three years, I switched to my own studio and became freelance. Tamaris became the largest customer I worked with, and a few ones next to it. I love the work from day one and watch the changes in the business as well as in my own. In recent years I've shifted from developing by drawings, 1:1 development, and the massive amount of designs I make per season, to more effort in presentation, software, detailing, and even prototyping. My passion remains on all sides - the unique and handcrafted, as well as for the development of collection and designing- and I strive for all of this.