Yarn Trends for Spring Summer 2019

Pitti Filati presents the research on the mood for this Spring Summer 2019 in their RAW section of the exhibition. The trend themes for SS19 explore the cause-and-effect of a time of media and technology intensity and overexposure. The Spazio Ricera, Pitti Filati’s creative hub, presented this mood across 6 themes, Raw Attitude, Raw Summer, Raw Shelter, Raw Data, Raw Masculine and Raw Feminine.

The theme takes its inspiration from Outsider Art/Art Brut and informal, emphasizing instinct. The concepts of raw and unprocessed identify a bona fide style. It is a primitive, naive image, without superstructures to characterize the research into new surfaces. Everything is strong and sculptural, solid, carved and free of excess, in a sole block of material, with just a few bold gestures. Monolithic volumes are highlighted by a use of uneven color, with broad anti-academic brushstrokes. Stitches imitate the movement of wooden surfaces sculpted through scuffing, which remains raw even after pictorial interventions, energetically underlining the informal style and the becoming of clothes.

On simple and rough volumes, the body will be optically suggested through the graphic use of the material. Layers of lacquer on raised areas will convey even greater volume to processes through well-placed patterns that are completely casual in their effect. Raw linen, hemp, jute, and cotton yarns for rough surfaces, dyes and wearing on the finished item convey a humane and lived-in look to the items.

Tuck stitches, uneven and casual, create extremely spontaneous-looking volumes. Expressive skill is translated into wild rolls of yarn of varying gauges. Patterns in blocks or in uneven stripes of color seem developed from a lack of yarn and the need to complete the knitwear in the right color. The outfit becomes primitive artwork. Knitwear is pieced together and is thrown on with a spontaneous and ever-changing spirit. It is textured with grooves and marks that have scratched the surface in search of shape. The colors are bold, chalky, and contrasting, with the thickness of oil and wax coming from the works that inspired and visualized this theme’s mood.

We are constantly in search of new stimulations and effects, in a course by now without limits. Few things truly manage to capture our attention and trigger our imagination. Our eyes have become spoiled and lazy because of the excessive offers and details, which, instead of exciting and stimulating, generate boredom and expectations that are more and more difficult to fulfill. The “new”, instead, bursts onto the scene like a rain-heavy cloud in a calm summer sky. Everything changes all at once: colors, air, sound.

Clothes are energetically brushed by an unexpected wind and when unraveled become frayed on the surface. The water itself— where we were bathing just a few minutes ago — begins to ripple and turns grey, creating restless veils held back by half belts.

The transparencies of agitated air disclose small patterns of objects lifted into the air by the wind. Accordion-like plays of clouds appear and disappear, imprinting themselves on light-looking items that are also puffy and spongy. The wind lifts the sand, eroding surfaces, which become wavy and transparent linen gauzes. A sensation of warmth and cold — of restraint and freedom, and an out-of-control nature – characterize the items. Transparencies are a hybrid of water and wind, moved by yarns that caress the barely veiled body. Flashes of lightning unite the sky with the earth, in rips across knitwear.

Waterfalls on wet surfaces creating a flicker of matte and glossy. Sunlight merges with the grey of clouds. In the summer, nature that is light, dry, and weightless is immersed in water giving life to three-dimensional reliefs on complementary transparencies. The action of water creates movement on new items that the wind dehydrates and fixes into plastic compositions. The most shaded effects result from overlapping textures across the entire garment. The drama and romanticism of a summer storm inspires this theme’s palette. Colors are delicate, yet tangible, like a clear summer mist caressing the skin. A group of pastel greys, ever-changing like a stormy cloud, are broken apart by a ray of sunset orange.

Shaping the raw earth is a very human and primitive gesture, marking the progress of a primitive man who makes his way out of the cave to construct his first dwelling. Raw earth is the material used to give shape to reality and the divine, covering surfaces, insulating from the heat and cold, decorating, writing, and telling a story. Raw earth is the material of greatest interest in architecture and design: international design contests pay homage to it by merging ancestral constructive techniques with contemporary lines. This theme is characterized by extremely simple lines and research into textures that are rich to the touch and raw to the eye. Primitive spires, arches, and organic constructive elements inspire knitwear with a textured and three-dimensional look. Simplistic lines are enriched by processes and raw imprinted patterns. Glossy effects convey a sensation of moisture, in the becoming. Surfaces are embellished by archaic signs, imprinted using wooden sticks.

The plasticity of the material gives life to important and voluminous processes, visibly lightened by nude elements. Clay is spread out, shaped by bare hands, and scratched with nails, to free and lighten the thickness to the point of transparency. Layers of the compact earth are eroded horizontally, fixed in place by the action of the sun, while suggesting archeological-like pleating. Knitwear is crafted like a block of clay. By surprise, these materials are first interpreted not only by natural yarns but also by polyester that imitates the uneven colors and textured surfaces of the raw material. The raw assembly of bricks, without mortar, inspires stitches and geometries, but also micro-processes that call forth the unevenness and cracks of bricks while translating the wild and manual contribution of man on the surface into a pattern. The items are archetypes of the garment, understood as bona fide dwellings for the body. Materials of vegetable origin, like straw, convey a more filament-like aspect.

Research into volumes and processes in a sole item mirror the continuity of organic material. Knitwear is dense and soft, with its own life, wrapping around the body as if it were modeled onto it. Techniques like casting give a human aspect to industrial materials like cement, which is mixed with earth, inspiring textured knitwear with modular panels. A new natural and delicate primitivism characterize this theme and its palette of earth-inspired colors. Al! of them are graced with a touch of green, conveying a raw and wet look. Terrains are in the midst of transformation. Essentially a fresher reinterpretation of natural tones.

Internet and technology have permanently changed our way of living, communicating, preserving, and remembering. Everything is online: purchases, documents, contacts, and money. Every one of our actions, over the course of the day, leaves a trace behind on the web. We are and we produce raw data that analysts harvest, study, and sell. How can we speak of concreteness and humanity in this increasingly virtual and liquid era? Will it be a blackout or a hacker attack that shakes our certainties and simplifications? Will the printed encyclopedia become the future format of Wikipedia? Will a stack of volumes divided according to color be our next desktop? In a virtual and parallel universe where changes occur faster than their online publication, will maybe the yellow pages be the safest and most reliable tool for our searches? Will the abacus be the tool that certifies the reality and trustworthiness of certain information?

This theme takes its inspiration from the invisible entity that manages and presides over the Internet and the less humane part of our present-day lives, translating abstract concepts into tactile images and concrete knits into a simple and primitive concept. An immense amount of information becomes almost artisanal knits dedicated to pixels, transfer speed, and compression.

Vintage-inspired knits interpret graphs and sets of data imagined and rationally stored in a more “solid”, material and concrete way. Data and its use will inspire knits with a geometric, futuristic mood that is decidedly nonindustrial, made up by fragments of reality, uploaded one-by-one onto your outfit. A rawer, wilder, and more humane representation of the non-technological management of data. The non-technological approach will be underlined by a prevalent use of natural fibers. The look is slightly hippie, slightly hacker. The colors of this theme conserve a natural aspect, foregoing fluo and violent shades: they are backlit and inspired by the light produced by a computer’s screen. A concept that conveys a futuristic light to the most natural and simple materials.

The next summer season sees the search for concreteness, confirmation, and humanity coinciding with the image of a man who is confident and comfortable, rough but reassuring. Self-assured and well-balanced. An image that is neither glossy or publicized, and nourished by the strength and elegance of the masculine portrait in figurative art. The portrait is understood as the channeling of a new masculinity, a visual cue and set of sensations which, with its translation into tactile feeling, inspires a theme exclusively dedicated to him.

Paintings, sketches, and photos reinforce the image and vision of a plain and necessary man, whose very essence is bared before us. The items are inspired by woolen intimate knits worn in the winter, which, with the arrival of warmer temperatures – and the removal of jackets and hats—is laid bare. A winter-oriented image persists, underlining the importance of wool and woolen elements also for the spring/summer season. They are worn inside pants. Knits express the same strength of charcoal, graphite, and oil lines, and a mix of artistic mediums and geometries, when present, look to abstract art. They are measured and separate pieces, slightly deconstructed geometries that mend areas of color on plain and informal canvases.

Patterns and geometries, when present, look to abstract art. They are measured and separate pieces, slightly deconstructed geometries that mend areas of color on plain and informal canvases. These externally-oriented intimate knits are enriched from micro-stitches and coarse-looking holes to the dawning of technical knitwear. A few references to sportswear are cited through woolen rowers’ tank tops meant to be worn next to the skin. Contrasting necklines and cuffs add a fresh touch to the mostly winter-inspired look. Summer weaves and textures are further enriched by uneven dyeing and scratched effects. Frayed textures add strength and humanity to surfaces, conveying a lived-in look. Colors are classic and masculine, strong and spicy, with warmed tones slightly yellowed by the sun, but seen in the shade in an internal setting that protects from the scorching summer heat.

Rejecting the role imposed by men and social conventions, in search of a feminine liberty that flowers under the veils of imposition; declaring itself by way of visual protest from the avant-gardes of feminist art, and from the 1940’s to present-day times. It is a theme that speaks of raw, wild aesthetics. And of hairs, understood also as a right that cannot be censured by conventions, an indicator of unrefined beauty that is once again wild. A feminist vision of fashion that does away with all the compulsory superstructures along with foundation makeup and hair removal. Knits are shapeless and do not force the body into conventional and recognizable shapes. Materials are at the limit of ambiguous, offering hybrid sensations between plastic and silk.

The new Venus shouts of a beauty that goes beyond volumes and defects of the flesh. Items are imprinted by the body, lightweight and shapeless to be worn like second skins of ourselves. Genitalia is crafted processes representing the new nude. Intimate items are externally expressive, shouting protest slogans; a new feminist manifesto inspired by bold, safe aesthetics using graphics as a tool and decoration in conveying a new sense to fashion.

A fashion unpleasing to the eye, without any special emphasis on the body’s shape, representing an intellectual kind of fashion. Embroidery, typically a craft associated with women — like ironing and cleaning —becomes a visual and decorative tool in expressing disapproval. Almost surreal objects and applications recall publicly displayed sexual attributes. Strongly contrasting colors, violent and distinctive, shout protest slogans in red and fuchsia, on the grey and black background of activist photography. White and flesh tones are a sensitive, sweet, and pure counterpoint.