Fur may be out of favour at the moment with the fashion set, but one Irish designer has come up with an idea for recycling these garments. In Dublin yesterday evening, Cyane Kingston showed second-hand beaver coats from which she had sheared off the pile to leave only a mangy-looking base. Far from being a protest against the global fur trade, however, this was part of an alternative fashion show in the Temple Bar Music Centre. According to organisers Enda McGrattan and Emma Kelly, the event was intended to be "a showcase for the vanguard of Irish creativity". Called Absolut Absolution and underwritten by Swedish vodka company, Absolut, the show featured 10 designers, most of them relatively youthful but all united in a determination to cause as much of a stir as possible. This is no longer a simple matter, given the outrageous behaviour and clothing seen on international catwalks over the past few weeks.
Still, determined efforts were being made yesterday to live up to a brief promising "freedom of expression, a feeling of freedom and a belief in oneself and one's creativity". So Cyane Kingston, in addition to sheared fur coats, showed short shift dresses with laminated panels containing locks of a friend's hair and, somewhat more mundanely, a gunmetal grey leather biker jacket and narrow leg pants. Her work was shown against an audio/slide installation shot in Iceland by Claire Langan.
Atlanta Rascher and Josephine Kilmartin collaborated on a "different" bridal collection such as a cowgirl outfit comprising denim jeans with six-inch turn-ups, sequin-covered stetson and maraboutrimmed waistcoat, and a Russian ballerina wearing lace-edged tulle skirt and a kimono-style top with flared sleeves and embroidered collar. Other contributors included hairdresser, Audrey McGrath, who showed heads painted in bright colours; club promoter and graphic designer, Niall Sweeney, whose oversized body shapes were based on lavatory door gender signs, and former artist-in-residence at IMMA, Laura Gannon. Her collection of clothes, modelled by film producer, Aine O'Connor, among others, were made from Japanese silk paper and hair before being caked in mud.
Despite promises of radicalism, not all participants were outside the mainstream. Ciara Walshe, for example, has spent the past five years working for Donna Karan in New York and Marc O'Neill's clothes are available throughout the country in branches of A-Wear.