{"id":9675,"date":"2026-03-31T15:13:07","date_gmt":"2026-03-31T15:13:07","guid":{"rendered":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/9675\/"},"modified":"2026-03-31T15:13:07","modified_gmt":"2026-03-31T15:13:07","slug":"what-makes-belgium-produce-so-many-exceptional-fashion-designers","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/9675\/","title":{"rendered":"What Makes Belgium Produce So Many Exceptional Fashion Designers?"},"content":{"rendered":"

When they went to London\u2014unlike other student newcomers of the time\u2014the six were already practiced at producing their own branding imagery. They\u2019d got that together on their own initiative in class. \u201cWe weren\u2019t taught that. Everybody had their own photographer we found in school. All those teams were formed together back then. And of course, Ann Demeulemeester already had her boyfriend Patrick Robyn.\u201d<\/p>\n

Demeulemeester and Robyn married before she started her brand. His evocative photography, capturing many of the designers\u2019 early collections, is all over the exhibition and the accompanying book. Their son, Victor Robyn, who many will remember as a child, walking with his mom at the end of her Paris shows in the \u201990s, is the exhibition\u2019s graphic designer.<\/p>\n

Demeulemeester herself was standing in the darkened room she\u2019d designed. Tall, attenuated silhouettes in black standing on smoky mirrored platforms emerged from the dark. Long bias skirts, sliding leather belts, feathered jewelry, elegantly asymmetric jackets, the glint of metallic knitwear. \u201cI wanted an atmosphere like you are in the night, and the silhouettes are standing on water. And it\u2019s a very cold moonlight.\u201d<\/p>\n

\"Image<\/p>\n

Ann Demeulemeester, spring 1990, \u00a9 Photo: Patrick Robyn<\/p>\n

It crystallized everything about Demeuleemester\u2019s passionate career\u2014her integrity, the wholeness of the world she created until she left her brand in 2014, to pursue her art and furniture projects. \u201cI selected them just like it was my friends that I was picking, okay, yes, let\u2019s take her. Let\u2019s take him. Not thinking too much,\u201d she smiled. \u201cJust showing what is the real thing, the clothes. What Ann Demeuleemeester is about.\u201d<\/p>\n

Walter Van Beirendonck was a year ahead of the others at the Academy, in the same class as Martin Margiela. \u201cIt was great, because we both came from a small village without knowing what was going to happen in the school.\u201d In fact, the only thing that sparking off each other produced\u2014as well as joining Antwerp’s underground performance scene, in Van Beirendonck\u2019s case\u2014was a determination to be completely himself. His cheerful, colorful, playful collections are a pioneering statement of queer pride against dark times, championing safe sex and anti-racism. They make as much impact now\u2014in fact, they\u2019re a collecting craze today\u2014as they did in the late \u201980s. \u201cFor me, it\u2019s not just making clothes, it\u2019s telling stories, but also showing engagement in the world.\u201d In the exhibition, a digital \u201cWalter\u201d face, implanted in a hoodie, conducts a conversation with his imaginary robot friend Puk-Puk, which stands opposite. Walter\u2019s cheery face beams out hope in creativity to the new generation facing difficult times.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"When they went to London\u2014unlike other student newcomers of the time\u2014the six were already practiced at producing their…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":9676,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[3040,7,6021,17],"class_list":{"0":"post-9675","1":"post","2":"type-post","3":"status-publish","4":"format-standard","5":"has-post-thumbnail","7":"category-belgium","8":"tag-ann-demeulemeester","9":"tag-belgium","10":"tag-dries-van-noten","11":"tag-walter-van-beirendonck"},"share_on_mastodon":{"url":"https:\/\/pubeurope.com\/@be\/116324440728070770","error":""},"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9675","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=9675"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/9675\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/9676"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=9675"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=9675"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.europesays.com\/be\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=9675"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}