Dutch designers Anouk van de Sande and Vera de Pont created their brand, AnoukxVera, in 2015. They make funky, colourful sportswear that is produced on-demand in order to avoid the wastage of excess or left-over stock. The brand takes a playful stance against the over production of clothing.
Both van de Sande and de Pont graduated from the department of Man & Identity at the Design Academy Eindhoven, focussing on the human body and its environment. De Pont presented her graduation project as one of our Global Graduate speakers at Design Indaba Conference 2016. The first AnoukxVera collection, “The Hairy Boob Collection”, launched in June 2016, accompanied by a WeTransfer wallpaper. This abstract collection combined the image of the hairy sportsman with a sexy silhouette.
The second collection, “Teeny Tiny”, launched in October 2016 during Dutch Design Week. Like the first collection, it also features graphic prints, imaginary scenes and visual stories. All the pieces are fabricated in the Netherlands, keeping production local is part of their brand ethics.
To coincide with their launch, the AnoukxVera factory created a film in which a teeny tiny world is presented, where an on-demand production line starts where ingredients blend as if preparing a fluffy bread.
Under the watchful eye of the puppeteers, the creators, the cooks of this collection, a piece of clothing is fabricated only when there is a need for it.
In the colourful, surreal movie we see dancing fingerstamps, boiling blue colour baths and wobbly ingredients that dive into a chaos of possibilities strange scenerios. They stretch the fit with a fingertip, change the materiality of a product by simply cooking it and smart inks fuse with the textile in a preprogrammed pattern.
These futuristic sportswear lovers prove that on-demand production can be colourful and fun, silly but serious, and that radical changes in the fashion industry can start with a teeny tiny first step.
Credits: Photography: Peggy Kuiper represented by Cake Film/Photography. Hair and makeup artist: Marije Koelewijn by Angelique Hoorn. Model: Katie Putzes
