"Expedition: Fashion from the Extreme" presents the
most challenging forms of human exploration.
Specifically, treks to the North and South Poles, ascent of the highest mountain peaks,
descent to the depths of the ocean and travel to outer space.
The exhibition traces how the clothing and equipment
made for survival in these environments found their way into high-fashion.
My name is Patricia Mears, Deputy Director of The Museum at FIT
and curator of "Expedition: Fashion from the Extreme."
Please join me on this journey through the first large scale exhibition
to illustrate the impact of extreme exploration on fashion.
Unlike earlier exploratory voyages, which were commercially or politically motivated,
expeditions to reach the North and South Poles were greatly influenced by the
rise of science in the 19th century.
Charles Darwin's seminal publication "On the Origin of Species" released in 1859
was one of the most influential books of its day
and it helped the desire to explore extreme environments.
Expeditions became even more popular thanks to the French writer Jules Verne,
who is credited as the father of science fiction.
His books "From the Earth to the Moon" published in 1865
and "Twenty Thousand Leagues Under the Sea" published five years later
were diligently researched and remarkably prescient, as Verne
anticipated space and deep sea travel decades before they became reality.
Prior to the 1960s, however, fashionable images of
the deep sea or the Arctic were relatively rare
and actual clothing inspired by these harsh and distant
environments was even rarer.
This began to change by the mid 20th century.
During the 1960s, fashion design and fashion photography
became wilder and more experimental.
During the 1960s, venerated couturiers such as Madame Grès
began to design après ski wear that resembled garments designed for Arctic explorers.
The explorer's ensembles in turn were invented and made by
indigenous arctic peoples such as the Inuit and the Eskimos.
Leading fashion magazines Vogue and Harper's Bazaar also
began to send models and photographers to the Arctic to capture otherworldly
images set amongst the icebergs.
By the late 20th century, indigenous Arctic garments
increasingly inspired leading designers such as Yohji Yamamoto,
Karl Lagerfeld for Chanel
and Jean Paul Gaultier.
Perhaps the best known Arctic inspired designs
were created by Isaac Mizrahi in 1994.
The 1995 hit documentary film entitled "Unzipped"
detailed the creation of Mizrahi's fall/winter 1994 collection.
Partly inspired by the groundbreaking 1922 documentary “Nanook of the North,”
"Unzipped" highlight moments such as
Mizrahi's love of fur pants.
"Unzipped" also included dramatic scenes in which
Mizrahi is demoralized to learn that Jean Paul Gaultier also produced an
"Eskimo" inspired collection.
But Mizrahi need not have worried as his ebullient,
brightly coloured and cheerful take on Arctic chic in no way resembled Gaultier's
more literal designs.
The parka, originally invented by the Arctic peoples, also became a wardrobe
staple during the second half of the 20th century.
Among the most popular parkas ever made
were the M-48 and M-51.
Designed with a long pointed back,
it became known as the fishtail.
Commissioned by the US military during the Korean conflict,
the fishtail was constructed to withstand the country's brutally cold winters.
Soon after the conclusion of the conflict,
the M-48 and M-51 became military surplus and were appropriated by counterculture groups
such as the mods in the 1960s,
the punks in the 1970s,
and in the 1990s, grunge.
Contemporary designer Joseph Altuzarra refined the fishtail in 2011
and it became one of the most popular fashion hits that season.
The down-filled jacket is a garment worn by millions of people today,
but outerwear made with goose and duck down feathers was revolutionary when the
first commercial versions were created in the 1930s.
Eddie Bauer began to design his down-filled jacket in 1935
and was awarded a patent in 1940.
In 1937, the Anglo-American couturier Charles James
designed the first high-fashion version made of eider down and white silk satin.
The popularity of down-filled garments
rose dramatically after 1953,
the year mountaineers Edmund Hillary and Tenzing Norgay became the first humans on record
to successfully reach the summit of Mount Everest.
By the 1970s, New York-based designers began to create chic, quilted and
high-tech fiberfill jackets that were featured in American fashion magazines.
Soon after, Charles James's 1937 evening jacket reappeared in popular
publications like Esquire and The New York Times.
By the late 1970s, Norma Kamali's "sleeping bag" coat made its debut.
It was not only a fashion hit;
it would presage other reinterpretations,
such as Martin Margiela's 2002 "duvet" coat.
The down-filled parka later known as the puffer or "puffa"
would become a ubiquitous clothing item worn by millions.
Thanks in part to Tommy Hilfiger's 1990s creations
that were popularized by leading hip hop artists.
Some hip hop stars also wore inventive costumes that were flamboyant
but also influential riffs on the puffer.
Recently, leading avant-garde designers such as
Junya Watanabe have been creating body obfuscating versions of the puffer while
Demna Gvsalia reconfigured the puffer,
paying homage to the great couturier, Cristóbal Balenciaga.
It was also during the 1960s that fashion became enamored with the Space Age,
which began with the 1957 launch of the Soviet satellite, Sputnik,
and ended with NASA's last moon mission in 1972.
Between 1964 and 1969, young Parisian couturiers
André Courrèges,
Paco Rabanne,
and Pierre Cardin
created cutting-edge fashions that were dramatically
different from the grand elegant styles of leading haute couturiers.
Theirs was the French response to a global youth movement
that had already emerged in London.
Parisian Space Age miniskirts and pant suits were sleek and geometric
and often ornamented with metal and plastic trimmings.
Although Space Age couture signified the ascendance of youth culture,
the garments were beautifully crafted in the timeless couture tradition.
Exploring the depth of the Earth's oceans is considered by many to be as
great a challenge as traveling to outer space.
Following World War II, professional and amateur
divers began to appropriate scuba and wetsuit technology.
Underwater exploration expanded and throughout the 1960s, skin tight wetsuits
worn by celebrity aquanauts proved irresistible to the fashion world.
Vogue and Harper's Bazaar regularly featured models in newly colorful wetsuits or
fashion accessories with face masks, goggles and flippers.
By the late 1980s, a few fashion designers had begun to
experiment with neoprene, a synthetic created for deep-sea exploration.
While other designers such as Junya Watanabe
created entire seasonal collections using waterproof synthetics that were
evocative of actual deep-sea garments, fashionable interpretations of the
wetsuit also became increasingly popular in the late 20th century.
Noteworthy examples included Karl Lagerfeld for Chanel's scuba jacket covered with sequins.
Whole collections featuring actual wetsuit material include Thom Browne's
stellar spring/summer 2017 menswear runway show.
In recent years, deep-sea exploration has also led to
the discovery of many new animal species.
Designers such as Alexander McQueen have crafted brilliant prints using images of
these otherworldly bioluminescent creatures that live in the oceans deepest environments
Like the burgeoning scientific endeavors that inspire treks to the farthest
reaches of the earth and beyond in the 19th century, "Expedition: Fashion from the Extreme"
is an early preliminary investigation of the rich and varied
world of extreme exploration and the many ways it has made its mark on high-fashion.
It is by no means a comprehensive study of either field
as topics are incalculably vast.
We readily recognize that we are only at
the onset of a long journey of exploration and discovery.
A journey we hope will continue in the centuries to come.