Culture

Tis the season to be scarfie

Aren’t these cosy numbers just so alluring? Bleemweaver is a bright, happy and imaginatively-woven textile range by Brianna Lee Martin. Combining her skills in weaving and design, this talented artist creates unique textiles entirely handmade in the Melbournian milieu of creativity. Each piece is individually handwoven by the artist using bright and beautiful Australian wools. Her fabulous new range includes scarves, neck warmers, hoods, shrugs, bags and throws. The perfect way to cheer up those chilly mornings of late. In fact, they almost make you want the thermometer to drop just an incy wincy bit more, just to justify your yearning for yarn.
 
Julia de Ville
 
Not since the plague has death been so in fashion. Admittedly, there has been a continuing obsession with skull iconography in both high-end (à la Marc Jacobs) and street-end fashion, yet Julia de Ville’s jewellery label Disce Mori (“learn to die” in Latin) pushes this morbid fascination a lot further.
 
With de Ville being part NZ fashion school graduate, part shoemaker, part jeweller and part taxidermist, her designs draw much of their inspiration from the Victorian period. With pieces ranging from $320 to a mere ten grand, de Ville works with a whole lot of, well, inert stuff. Vintage ivory, diamonds and rubies justify the larger-than-life price tags, while human hair and dead animal parts satisfy the macabre mood. Reminding us of our own mortality and challenging our perceptions of death in fashion, de Ville gives new life to things even though they are deceased. Potential collaboration with the Nom*D crew, perchance? Even if taxidermy’s not really your thing, this Kiwi designer’s peacefully dark pieces are definitely worth a geez. Available at a World store near you.