House of Style

Fashion culture drives consumption. The impulse to be current with clothing trends, (influenced by the competing forces of novelty and conformity) results in a tremendous amount of unnecessary waste. This is due, in part, to clothing being discarded well before it fails functionally. What if fashion drove performance? Or, maybe better, what if fashion was driven by two separate phases of performance? What if style was partially dictated by what an item of clothing might be used for after it serves its time as a fashionable garment?

House of Style is an idea sketch about consumerism, style, and “post-occupancy” pants. House of Style explores the idea of practice as a disruptive force by engaging a design discipline that falls outside the traditional territory of architecture (fashion). We are speculating on how a nexus between clothing design and architectural design could short circuit consumer behavior and therefore reduce waste. By mapping different cuts of blue jeans over a structural model for a barrel vault, we argue that clothing could both cover form in its first life, and become formwork in its second life. We are currently working with fashion designers to develop a line of BlueJeans that will work as formwork for future buildings. While relatively straightforward in execution, we believe House of Style offers an exciting methodology for emerging forms in architecture.   

HouMinn Practice
w/ HiLo Lab, Sébastien Roy, Stuart Lodge