Backstage at Vladimir Karaleev Spring/Summer 2010.

Christopher Filippini: How do you separate your home space from your working space, and what sort of objects do you surround yourself with?

Vladimir Karaleev: I don’t work at home. I’m afraid that I would eat the whole time or take a nap or something. It’s not like hard work but it’s something that I need to concentrate on, so I don’t work at home. This is also because I’m very chaotic when I’m working. At work I need a cozy environment. I like to have someone talking on the radio so I listen to an American talk show radio program—mostly political talk shows, like on National Public Radio.

Christopher: One of your earlier collections was based on a set of parameters that you gave yourself for the production, right?

Vladimir: Yes, that was the first one with the t-shirts. I kind of wrote like a dogma, six rules, and made it based on these rules. I found it to be a very nice way of working because sometimes I feel like there is no limit for doing things. I find it interesting to have a set of things that you are allowed and not allowed to do. The project was called 210 because I used 210 t-shirts. Every outfit was made with one t-shirt. More so, the first was made of one t-shirt, the next made of two, the next made of three and so on, which equaled 20 outfits.

So I sort of continued to work with small concepts, which was maybe important for me because it was about a working process. For the last collection, I worked with a lot of folding, starting with a square and making folds to form a jacket. To people who don’t know how clothes are made, it might not be very important, but for me it’s the process.

Christopher: Something I like about your work is that nice balance between craft and concept, where you can really enjoy it on either level.

Vladimir: Fashion, for me, is this combination between craft, technique and the process. Of course, it has a certain function and it should be worn. It’s not like abstract art but in a way, it shouldn’t be that obvious what it is. If you see certain pieces, it could be like an object and you could put it on the wall. But it wouldn’t become just like art.

Christopher: It would still be a dress hanging on the wall?

Vladimir: Yeah, exactly.

Christopher: Do you feel like your rules are being broken or compromised when they are being worn, or is it out of your hands once you complete a piece and a new set of rules come into place?

Vladimir: With the t-shirt pieces, it was visible for many people, like ‘Oh, it looks like a neck hole or it looks like a sleeve which is attached to a dress.’ So people who knew the process of how it was made, it was also interesting for them. In a way, they could wear it in a different way because it was visible for them and they knew what could be done with it.

Christopher: Were there some regulations for the current collection?

Vladimir: It’s this folding technique. For this particular tank top, I used a strip of fabric and it’s just put this way and folded as if it were an envelope or something like that. So there were a couple of things, which maybe make it look like a strange pattern, but it was a very simple in a way. This jacket was also a square, folded and draped.

Christopher: I like the hanging threads, the edges.

Vladimir: I didn’t really think why it was like that. This unfinished hem is like it has no end. Like it could be that long or it could be a hundred kilometers until the next collection. It could also exist in a situation. Almost everything is well done—you see the high street brands with perfect finishing and it makes sense in a perfect finishing context. So if you wear that, you should also have very well done shoes. It has a contrast. I read a really nice review about this collection. Some people see these and say that they are very badly done and unfinished and he cannot sew properly, but this girl said that they look like sketches. It’s just a fast way of putting fabrics through a machine, but I really like them like abstract paintings. They don’t have a shape. It’s just about the colors; it’s about the composition. So if you see a draped dress, it’s about the composition. It doesn’t matter if it’s finished or it’s not. It’s just color and form, I guess. It’s also about the contrast between the different structures; like a silk and a cotton that looks like paper, for example.

Christopher: They carry a feeling that we’ve caught you in the act of doing something that you love—something personal.

Vladimir: Yeah, and part of the concept is that it’s all handmade. Imagine you get a book that’s handwritten. So yes, I think that it’s very personal in a way.

Christopher: And the colors?

Vladimir: Actually I’m colorblind; I don’t see very many colors. When I order fabrics, I only take the numbers and somehow it works. I don’t know if I’m just lucky, or… I have a friend who is helping me sometimes with the colors. Also, we do a run through of the colors with the models, where we put the outfits in order by colors. In the school we were taught that you have to start by picking colors and then move on, but I can’t really think in colors in a way. I have to see the fabrics.

Christopher: Are you working with the design first or do you have the material in your hands and play with them?

Vladimir: I see the fabric and then start working with them on a puppet. Also the mood…If I’m feeling very calm then I make something more with small details, or if I have too much energy then I might make something big. But it depends on how the fabric feels and folds. I also make sketches, but afterwards. I knew someone who worked very technically, who made lots of sketches and then made a pattern and it would be exactly the same. It was perfect and she knew exactly what she wanted. For me, I don’t know what I want, and I want to see something that I’ve never seen in my life—like something that happens in the moment. So then, I realize there are these different ways of making clothes.

Christopher: I was wondering about where the energy comes from. Or if it even matters where it comes from just as long as it comes from somewhere…

Vladimir: And then you transform it in a way? I think that feedback is also very important. The way things are accepted. The whole process is important. When I start doing something and it goes a way that I like, I’m so happy in a way. I hear that working with the hands gives more satisfaction than working with graphics or something. Doing fashion, the result is really there. Architecture for example takes really long to be realized. With music you have result there right away. The first thing I think about when I start a new collection is how the whole thing will look like. If it starts bad then I know I have to start all over, but when the first good piece is born, then it’s like running down a mountain. It will work like you just needed the push.