-Marie Antoinette Goes To Liverpool -
Incorporating groundbreaking technologies in sustainable fabric innovations whilst merging the uncanny world of Marie Antoinette with his own Liverpudlian roots.
LONDON, 10 Oct 2022: Patrick McDowell revealed his new London Fashion Week collection and debut collaboration with TENCEL™️ lyocell fibres and TENCEL™ LUXE filament yarns, under Lenzing’s textile specialty brand, created to enhance sustainability in the luxury and high-end fashion sector.
This season, Patrick has set out to draw parallels between his Liverpudlian heritage and the world of French royalty taking inspiration from the opulence and overindulgence of Marie Antoinette, and the women of Liverpool that Patrick grew up watching peacock around his hometown. Combining the brand’s signature ‘PX’ logo with the ‘LET THEM EAT CAKE’ slogan McDowell reinvents the imperial French flag through the vision of the collection’s concept, infusing French couture with Liverpool staples, such as the tracksuit and the ball gown.
The collection draws upon pastel tones in an ode to Marie Antoinette’s preference towards colours representing youth and femininity combined with strong accents of chartreuse and noir. McDowell experiments with varying proportions of basqued waists and bouffant skirts, blending classic silhouettes with contemporary Liverpudlian twists. Playing with volume and proportion whilst juxtaposing tracksuits and corsets to bring these classic design features into a modern age, McDowell presents his vision unencumbered by gendered constraints.
The prints from this collection have been created from family pictures of Patrick, his Mother and Grandmother in their childhood years, drawing on the element of personal storytelling that is integral to McDowell’s design practice and reflecting on these childhood memories which Marie herself held so dear.
McDowell’s design philosophy remains true to a sustainable practice, working solely with recycled and sustainable materials, fabric made from TENCEL™ lyocell fibres and TENCEL™ LUXE filament yarns that has been provided by ELYAF and SÖKTAŞ.
Fabric printing has been undertaken by Esce-tex, using sustainable printing sources and techniques. Manteco® has provided MWool® fabrics and vintage silk has been provided by the Italian mill Taroni.
Alongside the main collection, The Restory have repurposed 25 pairs of luxury vintage shoes and football boots including some pieces designed by Professor Jimmy Choo; Founder of his namesake academy, the JCA | London Fashion Academy where Patrick is the designer in Residence. This redesign and restore service will become available for The Restory clients following the show - allowing clients to customise and rework their well loved shoes. The knitwear has been hand knitted by Wool and the Gang with sustainably sourced and chemical free yarn and will be available as a DIY kit after the show. Vintage British Military buttons have been used within the collection, accompanied by reclaimed Swarovski crystals, Eco interlinings were provided by Chargeurs and recycled plastic bottle wadding by thermore. In Partnership with Ecologi we have planted a tree for each show guest.
Each piece was designed and made in London with a low carbon footprint in mind, and will be available on a limited made-to-order basis following the show on McDowell’s newly designed website. As ever, avoiding overproduction and creating long lasting, emotionally connected garments that fit the client perfectly is the core aim of the McDowell brand.
The show has taken place at the historic building of 20 Hanover Square. Alongside Patrick’s collection there will feature looks from the inaugural MA Entrepreneurship in Design & Brand Innovation students from the JCA, where Patrick has been Designer in Residence since 2021.
“Making collections that are deeply personal is a labour of love. I feel like a part of me is inside each and everyone of these pieces. As ever, I have doubled down on what fashion means to me, who I am and where I come from. I’ve created a dream world of sustainable fantasy that captures the essence of peacock dressing for now. Growing up watching the scouse women around me get dressed up to go out and noticing how similar this felt to the writings about the court at versailles lead me to imagine a fictional past where Marie escaped the
guillotine and ran away to Liverpool ” - Patrick McDowell, Founder and Creative Director of Patrick McDowell
“Having Patrick McDowell as our Designer in Residence and Sustainability Ambassador this year has been an honour. Watching him grow as a professional in our incubation space, and for the students to see him develop his new collection at the Academy, has been extremely rewarding. Our iconic campus at 20 Hanover Square is a space that inspires us all, and I love how Patrick has taken inspiration from working in this space and integrated it within the core of this collection.” - Stephen Smith, JCA | London Fashion Academy CEO.
“We’re witnessing a new landscape of luxury that’s as driven to sustainability as it is to the universality of craft. Partnering with designers like Patrick, who shares our core values of sustainability, has allowed the TENCEL™ and TENCEL™ LUXEbrand to take its reach beyond the ingredient-end of the textile value chain to the wider industry as a whole. We recognise the continued importance of fostering partnerships in the textile industry to advance true systemic change.”– Harold Weghorst, Global Vice President Marketing & Branding at Lenzing AG
For further details, please contact:
Liz Roscoe
+44 (0)7702 807 048
liz@roscoe360.com
www.whitehair.co
About TENCEL™
TENCEL™ is the textile speciality brand under The Lenzing Group that covers textile speciality product fibre offerings for apparel and home. The TENCEL™ product brand portfolio defines a new evolutionary step in terms of sustainability, functional benefits, natural comfort and caters for distinctive everyday usage or application. Product brands under TENCEL™ include TENCEL™ Active, TENCEL™ Denim, TENCEL™ Home, TENCEL™ Intimate, TENCEL™ Luxe and TENCEL™ for footwear.
Featuring botanic origin and biodegradable quality, TENCEL™-branded modal and lyocell fibres can enhance the breathability of fabrics and have a minimal static charge when used in fabrics. Fabrics made of TENCEL™ Modal and Lyocell fibres are also gentle on skin with smooth, long-lasting softness, colour vibrancy and colour retention features. TENCEL™ Lyocell fibres are versatile and can be combined with a wide range of textile fibres to enhance the aesthetics and functionality of fabrics.
Through moisture management, TENCEL™ Lyocell fibres can also absorb moisture efficiently. A variant of the Lyocell production process also produces the TENCEL™ Luxe-branded lyocell filament yarn, which is an extremely fine filament yarn for luxury fabrics and supremely smooth to the touch. Exhibiting high flexibility, TENCEL™ Modal fibres enhance textiles with a naturally soft quality. Offering endless design possibilities, TENCEL™ Modal fibres can be blended with other fibres and processed using conventional machinery, significantly improving the softness and comfort of fabrics.
Fibres and filaments used under the TENCEL™ brand are derived from certified and controlled sources following the stringent guidelines of the Lenzing Wood and Pulp Policy. Namely, TENCEL™-branded modal and lyocell fibres are produced via environmentally responsible production processes and are compostable and biodegradable, thus can fully revert back to nature. They are designated by the USDA (U.S. Department of Agriculture) BioPreferred® Program. TENCEL™ Luxe is registered by The Vegan Society.
*About TENCEL™ Luxe
As a step-change in sustainable wood-based cellulosic fibre technology, TENCEL™ Luxe introduces eco botanic filaments, derived from wood grown in renewable, sustainably managed forests, in keeping with the stringent guidelines of the Lenzing Wood and Pulp Policy.
TENCEL™ Luxe-branded lyocell filament can be manufactured at a commercial scale and is produced in an environmentally sound closed-loop process that recycles process water and reuses the solvent at a recovery rate of more than 99%.
Osman’s TENCEL™ Luxe fabrics were produced by Shinjintex Co. Ltd, Sidónios Knitwear and Cocccon Crafts & Loom.
About the Lenzing Group
The Lenzing Group stands for the ecologically responsible production of speciality fibres made from the renewable raw material wood. As an innovation leader, Lenzing is a partner of global textile and nonwoven manufacturers and drives many new technological developments.
The Lenzing Group’s high-quality fibres form the basis for a variety of textile applications ranging from elegant ladies clothing to versatile denims and high-performance sports clothing. Due to their consistent high quality, biodegradability and compostability, Lenzing fibres are also highly suitable for hygiene products and agricultural applications.
The business model of the Lenzing Group goes far beyond that of a traditional fibre producer. Together with its customers and partners, Lenzing develops innovative products along the value chain, creating added value for consumers. The Lenzing Group strives for the efficient utilization and processing of all raw materials and offers solutions to help redirect the textile sector towards a closed-loop economy. In order to reduce the speed of global warming and to accomplish the targets of the Paris Climate Agreement and the “Green Deal” of the EU Commission, Lenzing has a clear vision: namely to make a zero-carbon future come true.
About Patrick McDowell
PATRICK MCDOWELL is an independent sustainable brand based in the heart of London. Founded in 2018 by designer Patrick McDowell, the brand has solidified itself as a leading voice on the global fashion stage as pioneer leading the way in sustainable innovation. After graduating from the prestigious Central Saint Martins, McDowell has strived to reinvent the role of a fashion designer as we know it today.
Showcasing his debut collection at London Fashion Week, the designer has since captivated the industry whilst gaining the recognition of titans who share Patrick’s vision for redesigning and creating an accessible, circular Fashion industry that creativity can flourish within.
In 2019, Anna Wintour nominated Patrick for the Stella McCartney Today for Tomorrow Award. In 2020, Patrick became a Global Ambassador for Graduate Fashion Foundation. Later that year he received a nomination for a British Fashion Award from the British Fashion Council. At the beginning of 2021, he was appointed Sustainability Design Director of the Italian womenswear brand Pinko and Sustainability Ambassador for Professor Jimmy Choo’s newly founded JCA academy, before moving his own studio into the academy as Designer in Residence in 2022. Patrick McDowell’s three founding pillars are: Support people and the planet, Uplift the Queer community and Nurture Creative education.
About JCA
JCA | London Fashion Academy is a pioneering fashion school and professional incubator founded by Prof. Jimmy Choo OBE and Mr Stephen Smith. It opened its doors in Mayfair in September 2021 to play a pivotal role in re-galvanising London’s fashion community post-pandemic and has been established as Mayfair’s international hub for all those interested in design and luxury brands. Taking inspiration from and disrupting the boundaries from the likes of the V&A, Royal College of Art, Parsons New York and Somerset House, the facility will be more than just an educational academy, providing contemporary co-working spaces for fashion start-ups, gallery and exhibition space and a calendar of networking and fashion-focused events. Since its opening in September 2021, the school has helped many students launch their projects, like Melissa-Kate, a Master's student invited to show at the Northern Fashion Week, and Scottish mature student Paul McCann, who has launched his label whilst in the first-year of his degree. It houses a number of professional designers, including its Designer in Residence, Patrick McDowell.