The Aje Resort 2023 runway show at Afterpay Australian Fashion Week (AAFW) was a journey of the senses. Held at the Museum of Contemporary Art in Sydney, the set was covered in soft total textures, as if carved out of stone, cocooning guests between art and earth. Symbolic of a cave-like space with music designed to instil nostalgia, one could imagine it being presented underground in Paris or New York, or a time and place that could exist anywhere.
A few days before the show, T Australia caught up with the co-founders of Aje, Adrian Norris and Edwina Forest, to talk about their love for artistry and how they express this through their new collection titled “Sculptura”. We meet at their Surry Hills headquarters and sit on a boucle couch in a sunlit room, surrounded by the Resort ‘23 collection, accessories, model casting boards, and textiles.
The idea of sculpture as an art form is to create realistic or abstract forms, initially using stone, ceramics, wood and other hard materials. The concept of structure coming from the earth, how the form interacts with natural elements, and the sculptors’ philosophies have influenced the Aje Resort 2023 collection. “We’re really inspired by the established and emerging sculptors. We’ve always done a lot with volume, and it was just about finding different ways to interpret that and different ways to create shapes,” says Adrian Norris, the brand’s Chief Executive Officer.
“We continually returned to the way in which [sculptors] use the earth as both the inspiration and subject of their art. During the design process, we were particularly drawn to the vivid hues found in the vast landscape art installations of Christo and Jeanne-Claude, the undulating hills of Maya Lin’s ‘Storm King Wavefield’, as well as Marlene Knudsen’s sinuous stoneware, and the modern florals seen in Simone Bodmer-Turner and Emma Kohlmann’s collaborative creations,” adds Creative Director, Edwina Forest.
It may feel like translating the idea and philosophy of sculpture into fabric and fashion don’t correlate, but Forest is a veteran at taking inspiration from artistic presences. In the past, Aje has created an immersive experience with fashion and art being created simultaneously alongside Sydney artist Chanel Tobler. The influence appears in the sculpturesque silhouettes, from draping, beading and asymmetrical accents as well as voluminous sleeves and bodices to create structure.
“There’s so much detail in our garments. When we have something as big an inspiration as sculpture, it allows us to go and really play with all those details and get so much stuff onto all the pieces, which I think is what makes them special,” says Norris.
Against the tonality of the runway, the Resort ‘23 prints in florals and freeform brushstrokes brought life, but it was the blue hues and pink statements that claimed us. It is a deepening of Aje’s perennial reverence for nature and art. “As we mark our return to Afterpay Australian Fashion Week, it feels especially poignant to be finding inspiration in places so true to our core, but in a way that feels honest for where we are today and where we hope to be in the future,” says Forest.
Like art itself, fashion is all about old becoming new again. For longtime Aje followers, their original, signature sequinned mini skirt has had a reinvention and return in the collection. The details in Aje make it different, with sleeves pulled and puffed and tucked. “We’re known for, like, big sleeves and extravagance. But how do we kind of pare that back a little bit? And so there are definitely elements of that in the clothing. We wanted this set to really kind of resonate with that as well,” says Norris.
Aje’s collections are ideated more than a year before they reach us. It is a creative process that Forest describes as “a constant flow between the different worlds we create each season. The creative process can be sparked by something as simple as a vase, a stone, a fabric technique, a feeling, a song playing on the sidewalk.” With that idea setting a limitless boundary, one can only wonder what world Aje will take us next.