This is a photograph of the Paco Rabanne’s “chain mail” dress which was a part of the exhibition in The Museum at FIT, “Expedition: Fashion from the Extreme”. This is a wedding dress that was made with little panels of silver plastic and pearlescent that added the geometric and futuristic looks to it. This dress was made during the space age, which arose in mid 60’s to reflect on the space expedition of United States and Soviet Union, and its launch of Sputnik. During the ‘Space Age’, designers like Paco Rabanne, Andre Courreges and Pierre Cardin created fashion that reflected the technological development and futuristic expectations of the 60’s. This garment used materials that were not commonly being used to provoke the feeling of new-ness, or taking a step to innovation. The ‘Space Age’ created anticipations to the future, inspiring artists and designers of the era. Stanley Kubrik released a film “2001: Space Odyssey” during the same era, articulating people’s fear of overwhelming technology development. This dress brought the idea to the extreme by introducing unwearable dress that resembles a space-wear. The relationship between the dress and the body became very contrasting due to its’ non-flexible materials which made the wearer uncomfortable. In addition, the dress gears more towards the avant-garde fashion world by revealing more skin than the conservative wedding dresses of the decade, resulting for the wearer to be more appreciable when it is on the body. I felt that the mix between the garment and the theme meshed well enough to create a piece that is visually engaging while taking this rather common theme and a ordinarily shaped dress to the extreme by restricting the functionality as a wearable garment.
