Feature: Lost & Found

For Parable’s second editorial, we had the privilege of interviewing Lost & Found creator, Ria Dunn. The following incorporates Ria’s responses to questions on philosophy, textiles and the creation of the wondrous paper jacket from the current AW2011 season.

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From the beginning, Lost & Found was a return to the modest and lasting. It is a label of subtlety and longevity, reflecting Ria Dunn’s movement away from disposable fashion, to a creative outlet where she could touch on purity and introspection. The label’s Tuscan surrounds are bucolic, and this is translated in clothes which carry the weight of history, thought and workmanship whilst remaining slightly askew – imperfections that tell of an older age of production and consumption.

It was the very tactile and sensuous nature of Ria’s work that lead her to fabric creation. The need for contrast and sensation – the dichotomy of rich and poor, of elegance and something undone – meant the work of Lost & Found could not be completed without new textile.

In the development of fabric and materials, Ria found a further outlet for expression. What was initially sparked by necessity soon became a way to progress concepts beyond small forms and details – to work and idea from its skeleton, from it’s literal and metaphoric fibre providing completeness in the development of idea into garment.

The nexus of technical production and the fragmented ideas of a collection, in utero, provide an interesting beginning for these new fabrics. Ria learns all she can about the technical processes, if only to find where boundaries can be crossed and experiments performed. As fibres are mixed in different weaves and stitches, the raw fabric takes form, which then gives way to the laborious but invigorating finishing process. This is where Ria describes the materials as coming alive - through over-dying and resins she manipulates fabrics in a way that changes them completely from their raw form.

In perfect example of the textile experimentation process, Ria tells the story behind the linen-wool amalgam used in both the long coat and box jacket. Starting life as polished linen bonded with wool, Ria was unsatisfied when a successful small-scale test was translated into a larger piece of fabric – a nagging failure which sat in prototypic limbo. On a last whim, she decided to “wash the hell out of it”. The result was an amazing, creature-like texture of disarming lightness and complexity. Images: [1] [2] [3]

In production, these garments were to be object-washed – Ria standing guard over the industrial washers, checking the garments minute-by-minute like some compulsive baker, in what she describes as one of the most risky garments Lost & Found have ever produced.

Of the many materials which span the current collection, including wool, paper, alpaca and angora, it is humble cotton that Ria identifies as her favourite at present. Its history, and the many expectations attached to such a ubiquitous fabric present an opportunity for digression: “I have been trying to create the opposite of what many expect cotton to be”. She explains her enjoyment in breaking convention by re-purposing cotton for use in winter garments – cotton crepe mixed with wool and angora, or a shantung silk – Ria describes cotton as the most natural, and most intimate fibre against the skin.

The fit of of the current Autumn-Winter season typifies the philosophy – the heartbeat – of Lost & Found. The generous, and very organic lines verge away from the conventional tailoring of men’s garments. Ria explains this choice was both a celebration of the beautiful materials – with the added volume translating to a much richer silhouette – but also provided what she felt was a more sensual, and ultimately more comfortable form.

> Above photos by Alessandro Esteri for Lost&Found Design

Showcase: Paper Jacket

Of all the pieces in the current collection, and of all the pieces at Parable, it is the Paper Jacket which draws the most interest from people who experience it in-person. People are at first drawn to its colour and texture, but then, in what Ria would consider an utter success, are compelled to interact with it: the tactile experience of rubbing the slightly waxy paper between finger and thumb; feeling the wool layer beneath adding unexpected texture and softness; inspecting each crack and groove which give only a glimpse of the piece that will only reveal its true form with wear.

The choice of paper was one that could only be made, and executed by a true artist. Ria’s love for artistic materials – paper, waxy crayons, heavy oil pastels and graphite – formed into a garment reflects precisely her view of creation and consumption. The paper used is very common packing paper, and was chosen because of its lack of durability. Though it begins life crisp and rigid, as it is worn it will decompose on the body, changing colour and cracking over time. The concept is one of transposing experience onto a garment, to watch as the jacket deteriorates with each wear, to track events on its surface until the dirty mess of life is entwined with the beautiful patina of the garment.

View the entire Lost & Found collection.