By Ben Dreith

Erika Solway, creator of Bebop Studio, is releasing her graduating thesis collection Lucid Walks with Soft Construction for her four-year degree in the Wilson School of Design’s fashion design program. Born in Toronto but raised in the Lower Mainland, Erika’s line is sure to breathe some fresh, conceptual air into the B.C. fashion scene.

Erika’s elaborately printed clothing tries to capture the intersections between one’s identity in relation to conceptual art appreciation, androgyny and sustainability. Utilizing her skills in print design, she incorporates iconic surrealist themes and designs into wearable, eco-conscious clothing. The convergence of concept, style, and execution, all put together with attention to detail and a personal appreciation of visual art, are meant to reflect the apparel desires of what she terms “androgynous intellectual” identity.

Lucid Walks with Soft Construction will be unveiled at the 2019 The Show on April 18 at Kwantlen Polytechnic University’s (KPU) newly opened Wilson School of Design building in Richmond. The beautiful and innovative $36-million building houses a range of design programs including the fashion-design-and-technology program.

Event details and tickets can be found online.

Ben Dreith: Who or what was the inspiration behind your line?

Erika Solway: My line is inspired by surrealism as an art movement and the figure of the androgynous intellectual. I feel they both have a lot in common, and there was a space for them both to grow together through apparel. I noticed a lack in the availability of artistic clothing that referenced all the amazing and influential art we have today in a way that was wearable and not too kitschy. I had this vision of meshing conceptual art with print design. I find it fascinating being able to visually tell a story and to create a connection through artistic reference.

BD: Who are you style inspirations?

ES: I don’t know that I look to specific people for style inspirations—I find inspiration in all things—from icons like Zendaya to my friends to people on the street to Chef’s Table. For this line, I found stylist Ana Gimeno Brugada a real inspiration, as well as what Gucci has been doing the past few years. I find myself most inspired by Pierpaolo Piccioli of Valentino, Henrik Vibskov, Schiaparelli, and Alexander McQueen.

BD: Describe your educational Journey?

ES: My journey at Kwantlen and the Wilson School of Design has been a real roller coaster with awesome teachers and classmates supporting me along the way. I never intended to be a significant seamstress and was much more interested in clothing as a design form than fashion itself. Being a diverted art student, I found myself very attached to surface design and the computer work that goes into clothing design. I have deviated, in a way, from the traditional path of most Kwantlen students and focused on the more graphic design aspects of the apparel industry, and spending time self-teaching a lot of added Photoshop and illustrator skills.

BD: Walk me through your creative process?

ES: Well, I usually start out with an idea, like an inkling that I tend to get very fixated on. Then move right into research, because a lot of my inspiration and process is dependent on research. Every garment in my line has a custom print inspired by a surrealist painting, so the research component is important to get a cohesive feel.

Doing in depth research is such an important step because everything needs to be connected, and every decision you make needs to come back to something. That’s really important to me, because how is someone else going to connect to it? After research, I move to sketching and paper problem-solving pretty quickly. Then lots of inspiration boards later, I dive into a digital medium where the rest of the ideation occurs before a tangible product is produced.

BD: Can you talk a bit about your approach to “sustainable” design?

ES: Conscious design is something that is very important to me. When creating my line, I really wanted to make something that wouldn’t remain in a landfill for 200 years, and so I decided to make my clothes without using any plastic components or fibers. All-natural materials give it a better chance in the afterlife and a better chance for re-use and repair. It is better for the skin and won’t have any micro-plastics coming out of the wash.

As fashion students, we are exposed to a lot of unsustainability in the fashion industry—it’s creating a lot of pollution every day. Studying fashion for four years shows you how disappointing the industry is right now, and a lot of us are concerned with all the fast fashion brands popping up with more t-shirts to appease the seemingly endless consumer appetite.

I think a way to combat this at a consumer level is to rethink about how we look at clothes, learning mending, and shopping second hand. At a designer level, I think it’s about designing for longevity, vitality, and transparency. Knowing where your creations are ending up and actively trying to reduce that, even if it means producing less.

BD: Your collection features themes that reference painters and other visual artists, what is the connection between fashion and art movements to you?

ES: There is this sense of timelessness that certain aspects of both these topics possess. Fashion and art sort of have this mingling effect. There is this notion that we wear things and choose things to reflect on our bodies because of how we connect or feel about it. I think many of us really connect with certain art movements and creating a way to wear these ideas can be very valuable.

BD: Your designs foreground surrealist motifs. Why do you think that fashion should reflect our tastes, interests, and conceptual outlooks?

ES: That’s a good question! Surrealism is fascinating to me—the portrayal of one's own unconscious through art was revolutionary. I think it appealed to me from a fashion design standpoint because it’s all about the little details that few would really understand or notice. Plus, it was a challenge, to create wearable prints that would appeal to the coveted creative intellectual. 

I could have made my line inspired by spring blossoms and create a bunch of florals, but I think I would have gotten pretty bored. I wanted this to be a project I would be entirely proud of, and if the surrealism enthusiast connected with my work and understood the references, it would be worth it! That’s what really gets me excited, seeing other people get excited about something I created for them.