ARXI – Wearable Architectural Details by Konstantin Kofta

Known for his daring and unconventional leather-accessory design, Ukrainian fashion designer Konstantin Kofta has just released his latest collection of leather bags and clutches. Kofta likes to draw inspiration from natural shapes, like seashells and parts of human anatomy, which he then transforms into fully-functional garments and accessories. Bearing the title “ARXI”, Kofta’s SS16 collection takes the designer’s approach a step further, by incorporating and inspired by forms and imagery found in Baroque architecture.

For Kofta, the curves, botanical decorations and spirals seen in Baroque architecture are a “dramatic” opposite of the straight lines and regular forms that a building otherwise has. By transforming these architectural elements into wearable objects, Kofta attaches the “artificial nature” seen in Baroque art onto the human body, creating a poetic juxtaposition between the architecture of the human body and that of a time long past. All of the bags and accessories in this collection were made by pressing fine leather onto special hand-made sculptural frames that are made in-house and one-by-one by a dedicated sculptor. Once the leather is pressed on them, it is in turn painted over with a custom-made grey paint and finished with different kinds of wax to give the impression of concrete or plaster.

via Yatzer