We look to a different set of seasons to that of the fashion elite and fast fashionistas. Instead of leaning on seasons as a way to sell more new stuff, we choose to follow the natural lifecycle in three phases - Birth, Life and Afterlife - and use each one as a moment to focus, comment and consciously reflect. These are A.BCH Seasons and while it's not every year we get to create a lookbook, this year we were fortunate enough to collaborate with the wonderful photographer Odin Wilde to create both our lookbook and A.BCH Seasons campaign. Campaign treatments and collages were developed by creative duo Jasmine Holm and Marcus Hollands of Graphic Services NYC. Read on for more...

Lim wears the Red Line Cutpiece Thermal in ivory + A.55 Strap Tube Top in bone + A.31 Long Sheer Skirt in black (coming April 2023) + A.41 Rib Split Skirt in undyed.

Lim wears the A.15 Classic T-Shirt in Recycled Undyed + A.55 Tube Strap Top in undyed (custom).

Lim wears the Red Line Life Preserver in white + A.58 Raw Denim Trousers in dark indigo (coming March 2023). 

The lookbook and campaign visually convey the concept of Monstrous Hybrids for the 2023 season of Birth. A term coined by Michael Braungart and William McDonough in their ground breaking book Cradle to Cradle, Monstrous Hybrids can be as insidious as they sound yet pervasive in almost all mainstream product design. They occupy our world in a most unnatural way. 

Lim wears the Red Line Tube Corset in black (coming March 2023) + A.47 Plaid Scarf in marigold + A.53 Midi Slip Skirt in black.

Lim wears the A.25 Bolt Plaid Skirt in marigold + Red Line Reversible Quilt Vest in marigold and navy.

 

By choosing such a concept, we are guided into considering why things are made the way they are. We ponder the impact of these monstrosities – created by humans making clothes, by mixing biological, non-biological and chemically treated textiles and trims, locking them into something relatively difficult to disassemble - uneconomical to recycle - impossible to break down.

Lim wears the A.34 Thermal Top in marigold + A.34 Thermal Top in ivory + A.55 Tube Strap Top in bone.

Lim wears the Red Line Asymmetrical Cutpiece Top in marigold, black and ivory + A.41 Rib Split Skirt in black.

 

At A.BCH our aim is never to create one single Monstrous Hybrid, however difficult that may be. Most clothes made today are pumped out in mass quantities into the hands of consumers who, as a general rule, wear them very little before donating or discarding them. The rest is destroyed, stored in warehouses or sent to rot in landfills. Regardless, all of these clothes are created with little regard to what will happen to them NEXT. Why is this the case?

Lim wears the A.38 Trench Coat in dark indigo + A.38 Trench Coat in recycled light indigo.


Lim wears the A.56 Maxi Dress in recycled light blue marle + A.40 Denim Skirt in recycled light indigo.

 

Because it is cheaper and more profitable (currently) to stick to the status quo. It's difficult to reinvent the garment lifecycle and to design new ways of stitching or closing a garment. It's more costly to change. It requires taking the utmost responsibility for something largely unseen.

Lim wears the Red Line Cutpiece Baby T-Shirt in aubergine, charcoal and black + A.40 Denim Skirt in dark indigo.

Lim wears the Red Line Cutpiece Apron Dress in aubergine, charcoal and black + A.58 Raw Denim Trousers in dark indigo (coming March 2023).

In conclusion, we welcome the return of the season of BIRTH so that we may consider all these things and more. We hope you will join the conversation this season as we work to determine (from the beginning) what will happen next in the lifecycle. Because we can take action for circular design by making future focussed decisions right now.

Until next time,

Courtney