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Tuesday, March 19
The Indiana Daily Student

arts

IU graduate to present ‘Resilience Á La Mode’ Fashion Show

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The Grunwald Gallery of Art will host Rebloomed Design, “Resilience á La Mode Fashion Show” on Saturday from 6 to 8 p.m. Rebloomed Design by Daisy May presents “Resilience á La Mode,” the artistic communication of fashion through a collection made entirely of recycled designs. 

Entry and all events are free and open to the public at the gallery. 

“Resilience á La Mode'' will be featured in the Eskenazi School of Art, Architecture and Design Faculty Exhibition. The exhibition contains artwork by more than 50 faculty artists from a variety of disciplines within the Eskenazi School. In the gallery, many of the pieces focus on politics and human connection. Serving as the backdrop to the gallery, the fashion show will create dialogue between such topics and the convergence of art and fashion. 

Attendees can expect to see a total of 18 ensembles created out of recycled materials from the 1900s, dating back to the 1940s, all the way to the 1970s. Drawing inspiration from the early 1990s’ Vivienne Westwood designs and garden aesthetics, May ensures that each upcycled piece in the collection matches a specific color palette to fit the particular textile and model. 

Started by IU graduate Daisy May, Rebloomed Design is a Bloomington-based clothing brand made entirely from recycled materials. May repurposes secondhand materials into clothing that she wants to be both a symbol of nostalgia and comfort. 

“What others would deem unusable, I've tried to come up with unique ways to make them into something new and give them a life beyond a landfill,” May said. 

May was featured as one of four IU student artists on billboards around Bloomington as part of the College of Arts and Sciences 2021 Themester of Resilience. “Rebloom” shows May freefalling from the sky and depicting the difficult journey toward resilience.

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The Grunwald Gallery of Art will feature Rebloomed Design on Saturday from 6 to 8 p.m. Rebloomed Design by Daisy May presents “Resilience á La Mode,” the artistic communication of fashion through a collection made entirely of recycled designs.  Courtesy Photo

“I want my clothing to represent what it is to be resilient, to be at your lowest, about to be thrown away into a landfill, and then come back and create a new life from that,” May said.

When it came time for May to pick a title for her fashion show, she kept with the theme of resilience and put her own twist on it. 

“The ‘á La Mode’ aspect of the title refers to the fact that it’s possible to have resilience in fashion and to be fashionably resilient,'' May said. “Á la mode means ‘on the side,’ so I like that it has this double meaning.”  

May graduated from IU’s fashion design program in 2020. She had planned and designed an entire collection for her senior thesis show, but it was canceled the week before. While she has organized pop-up events in the past, she says this will be the first time she’s able to curate an entire collection with the sole focus placed on her work. 

“Although it is an entire year late, it makes me feel really good that I'm finally coming full circle with my degree with Indiana University and also really connecting with my style and who I am as a designer,” May said. “These pieces I feel truly reflect who I am, my values and my artistic style and aesthetic, too.”

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