Future Beauty: 30 Years of Japanese Fashion

I've been meaning to mention this exhibition at the Barbican Art Gallery for weeks, it's coming to an end at the beginning of February, so there is still time to visit. Here is the blurb from the Barbican wesbite...

" Future Beauty: 30 Years of Japanese Fashion is the first exhibition in Europe to comprehensively survey avant-garde Japanese fashion, from the early 1980s to the present. Curated by the eminent Japanese fashion historian Akiko Fukai, Director of the Kyoto Costume Institute, the exhibition explores the unique sensibility of Japanese design, and its sense of beauty embodied in clothing.

Japanese fashion made an enormous impact on the world fashion scene in the late 20^th century and designers such as Issey Miyake, Rei Kawakubo and Yohji Yamamoto redefined the very basis of fashion. Their works will be shown alongside Kawakubo’s protégé, the techno-couturier Junya Watanabe, together with the acclaimed Jun Takahashi, and the new generation of radical designers including Tao Kurihara, Fumito Ganryu, Matohu, Akira Naka, Mina Perhonen and Mintdesigns."

Judging by the pictures, it is amazing, I love Japanese fashion.

I'm going to meet some fellow bloggers there on the 15th January, Karen from Did you make that and Jane from Handmade Jane.

There are some great courses running at the Barbican if you are nearby, these caught my eye, 'Flatness and Form' which is about innovative pattern cutting techniques. Future Fashion: family workshop - take your 5 year old future fashion designer along. And this one about Kawaai and fashion, what could be better?

I have for some time been meaning to add a 'what's on' section to my blog with links to big exhibitions and shows. Once I have successfully cloned another me I will get on to it right away. Otherwise, look out for some blurry 4am blog posts...

Quilts: 1700 - 2010 exhibition at the V & A

 Rajah Quilt, Made by convicts on board HMS Rajah, 1841

Quilts are everywhere at the moment, every time I open a paper or magazine there seems to be an article on the popularity of craft, surge of sewing machine sales and especially about how cool it is to quilt. With perfect timing, the V & A museum has a major exhibition running from 20th March to 4th July showing 65 quilts from 1700 through to present day. The majority of the quilts will be from the V & A's collection but there will also be some new works by contemporary artists such as such as Grayson Perry and Tracey Emin.

To celebrate the exhibition, the V&A Shop and Liberty fabrics have collaborated on a limited edition collection of printed cottons featuring designs from quilts in the V&A's collections. These are a few of my favourites, it's quite a reasonable way to acquire a few Liberty prints, they have fat quarter bundles too.  If you make it to the V & A, the gift shop there is really good, as is the book shop.