Have you ever heard of a dress made of newspapers? A dress made of newspapers was produced to commemorate the opening of Hankyung.com bnt news which is a Korean economy newspaper site. With unprecedented material,designer Yuhnu Kim (KIM) made the dress conspicuously transforming newspapers into a gorgeous dress. She said,“Newspapers are so weak in moisture and tear easily because these are very thin. That’s why I carefully pleated them one by one. This elaborate work nearly wore away my fingerprints.” She is also a fashion designer and owner of the brand, vivid beach. The Sookmyung Times (SMT) met her and listened to her enthusiasm about being eco-friendly through recycling fashion design.
2009 VIVID BEACH DESIGNER
2009 THE 3rd SEOUL YOUNG
FASHION DESIGNER CONTEST,
Winning prize
2009 Graduated from Clothing and
Textiles, SMU in Division of Human
Ecology
2008 SEOUL MODELIST CONTEST,
Undergraduate Award, First prize
2008 NEXT GENERATION FASHION
CREATOR CONTEST, The Next
Fashion Creator prize
2008 THE 2nd SEOUL YOUNG ARTIST
BIENNIAL, Works exhibition
SMT You graduated from Sookmyung Women’s University (SMU) i n Clothing and Textiles, but do you have any other moment to become a designer specially?
KIMI desired earnestly for the fashion world since I was very young. In my childhood, I didn’t know the designer as a job clearly. Then I just loved clothes and dreamed to be an entertainer stylist, so I gobbled up fashion magazines every night. Because my parents wanted me to go the department of science and engineering, I forgot my desire for fashion and studied hard. But, one day, I accidentally watched the ‘02’ f/w John Galliano Show’ TV program. My heart started beating faster and I couldn’t forget how I felt while watching the show. And I remembered how much I loved fashion.
SMT You work at vivid beach, which is a special women’s swim suit designer brand. What difficulty do you have creating your own brand?
KIM Managing my own brand is what I should have responsibility to
my design and decision. The hardship of physical strength can’t be compared to the emotional tiredness. The quite mental stress was so hard to me at the beginning, but I got used to this work and tried to enjoy my work as much as possible. People say ‘many hands make light work,’ so there is also another person who is a vivid beach designer. We cheer each other up and work together.
SMT Could you briefly introduce vivid beach? Do you have a publishing slogan or only the brand’s own merits?
KIM Vivid beach is a women’s swimwear line targeting confident and active women of all ages who have a perfect sense of style. You can see various designs such as beach swimwear,indoor swimwear, and comfortable swimwear for aquatic sports. We show only swimwear at present but we will enlarge our sphere to beachwear and sports casual, so it is good that the people who match sensibility with our brand have a lot of attention and watch all the time.
SMT What do you think is the most important thing as a designer?
KIM I think it is a designer’s values. It is very important to know when designers design what sort of a designer I am, what I pursue, and whether there is only my value. Sonia Rykiel wanted to make comfortable and stylish clothes for old women so she had a lot of people open their purses for clothes made of knit. And Hussein Chalayan knocked people sideways freshly because she performed a new experiment on a general idea of clothes and broke away people’s senses. Although everybody pursues her own design theme, I think the outcome is influenced a lot by whether they have values themselves. The designer who has this thinking can’t copy others.
SMT Do you have your own view of fashion and design? What is your latest design you are promoting?
KIM I always mentioned ‘eco’ and ‘a human body’ in design. Two of the fashion world’s problems are artificial chemicals used in manufacturing materials and discarded clothes because of fast trend rotation world-wide, so my design has to have an eco-friendly concept. Although eco-friendly design didn’t progress this season, in the coming season, I will show clothes which are made of recycled fibers from plastic bottles and biodegradable materials that quickly return to soil. The parts of the human body make for constant study. When I understood bones, joints and form, my clothes are more comfortable than existing clothes, because the clothes are not for a manikin but for a human. I would like comfortable clothes as well as clothes made with a pretty design
