Fashion / Style

Designing Sisters are Having a Major Moment With New D.C. Exhibit, Movies and More: Hanging With Kate and Laura Mulleavy on Main Street

BY // 10.23.18

Next month, the National Museum of Women in the Arts in Washington, D.C. will showcase Rodarte, an exhibition of designers Kate and Laura Mulleavy’s work spanning over a decade. Since the brand’s inception in 2005, the sisters have shown 27 collections — both in New York and Paris, created costumes for both stage and screen — including for the acclaimed 2010 film, Black Swan, and continually intersected the worlds of fashion and art.

Last year, they even wrote and directed their first feature film, Woodshock, starring Kirsten Dunst. Now, their museum-worthy line is carried at Forty Five Ten. We met with the sisters on Main Street and chatted about everything from artistic integrity to being bitten by the film bug.

You just presented your Spring 2019 collection at New York Fashion Week after showing your last few collections in Paris.

Laura: Going back was kind of like a really great homecoming. It was very beautiful. It’s very emotional, that kind of experience. 

The show looked amazing — tell us about the venue you chose.

Kate: The Marble Cemetery — it’s a historic landmark. There are mausoleums but they’re mostly underground, which is pretty interesting. The actual space looks like this beautiful old section of New York. We thought it was important to somehow capture something that is very magical about New York, but unfortunately spaces like these are few and far between.

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A lot of these hidden gems are really tucked away now as the city gets bigger and bigger. It’s important to kind of take a moment and really appreciate the things that make you love New York. It was definitely an amazing place to have done a show — it was really magical.  

What was your biggest inspiration for this season?

Laura: We started with a rose garden. When we were doing our music meeting, we realized there were some elements of Kate Bush in there — a singer from the ‘80s who is really amazing and talented. But we slowly started to realize that our collections weren’t about an inspiration anymore, it was really just about the Rodarte DNA. I hope that that the people in the audience — which was our smallest yet because of the venue we chose — would say that, rather than an inspiration, there was a very strong, intense emotion. That’s what I get from it now.

Speaking of the Rodarte DNA, we are so excited about the upcoming Rodarte exhibit.

Kate: We’re independent designers so the show is literally everything that we’ve done from our first collection — the only thing that won’t be represented is the collection we just did. But it’s everything from our Paris couture show, costumes from Black Swan, from our own film. There are going to be over 90 pieces — all full runway looks or costumes. It’s so interesting to see the collections that represent us and our identity as designers, and how it’s grown over the years.

You’ve always had such an artistic point of view and clear vision. How have you managed to maintain that as the fashion industry has changed over the years?

Laura: There are certain standards we have for ourselves artistically. Whenever I think of what I’m a fan of, the things that have spurred my intellectual growth, or the things that, looking back, I want my career to feel like or how I want people to talk about it — it’s all about having integrity, not conforming, and not changing your path toward mass market ideas. Right now, the trend toward homogenization is so strong.

There’s a battle of the artistic spirit, and every person that can fight it should. We’re all trying to get our voices heard and ensure people don’t feel like they have to just sell out. It’s so important to keep hold of your values and beliefs and not give them up.

What would you say is your role in this as a designer?

Laura: High fashion has always been, to me, new ideas challenging old ideas. Our job is to always ask what new ideas we can put into the world that challenge the status quo. That’s what we’re here to do. I guess everything kind of falls in line with that because the only way to do it is to stand by your beliefs and not compromise.

Just last year, you also made a big foray into film with your debut of Woodshock. How did you do it all?  

Kate: Coming back to do our show in New York gave me this realization that, in the span of a two year period, we did a couture show in Paris; we wrote, directed, and shot a film; edited it; took it to Venice Film Festival; released it in theaters; and then we did another collection; and then we were doing this. It really was a huge thing to do.

How was the creative process different when making your film as opposed to designing?

Kate: Creatively, it was the biggest thing I’ve attempted or ever done. People say when you’re getting into the process you’re either going to be in love with it and want to do it the rest of your life – which I immediately felt when we did it. But I also felt like it was the biggest stretch and I know that every film that we work on will be a huge stretch artistically.

Clearly, those are the kind of experiences Laura and I like. In fashion, we threw ourselves into it not knowing anything. And in film, it was a similar scenario. We didn’t go to school to study it… we kind of just had to trust a lot of our instincts. As a designer and as someone who is artistically inclined, in a weird way, the most comfortable place you can be in is the one where you know the least.

I always say it’s like standing at the edge of the Grand Canyon. You’ve just got to make these leaps. But, again, it didn’t really hit me what a huge feat it was until we were back in New York for our show.

Laura: Making Woodshock was an incredible life changing experience that definitely altered the way I think about design and what I want to get out of it myself. Because filmmaking is such an emotional, heartfelt process, and you build this family with the people you’re doing it with. The family you have in design is also so important, so it made me look differently at what we were doing and how we were doing it and what I wanted to feel out of it.

It must have been a great time to reflect — coming back to something familiar after going through such a time of personal growth.

Laura: Exactly. It was the only time in my life where I could really feel — I noticed a difference in myself. It was like, ‘Oh, I’m a new person now.’ Other times in life when change happens, like going to college, you then come out of it and kind of live that experience of the growth. But with this, after a month and a half of shooting, I was a completely different person. It was exciting to go through that and to emotionally connect to those changes and to watch it happen.

So are more films in your future?

Laura: Yes. We’re working on our second film. And that will be very special.

We want to know what else is inspiring you right now. What are you listening to? Reading?

Kate: We’re listening to Kate Bush a lot. And the Talk Talk. They both ended up being included in our show.

Laura: I’ve been reading a Taschen book on symbols that my friend gave me — I like to read it when I’m in that creative process and look up whatever I’m thinking about and then it kind of tells you about the symbolic history. It’s really thick. It kind of triggers a mental exercise, thinking about how things are interconnected. Like, the meaning of the egg, and how far that goes back and all of the ways you could look at it.

Kate: Well we had a scene in our film, a very long 10 minute scene, that culminates in Kirsten’s character breaking eggs. We knew there was a lot of feminist perspective and theory in the scene when we were making it, but when Laura got that book she was like ‘you’re not gonna believe this.’ If you read that egg book while you’re watching the scene, you will have such an interesting interpretation.

Laura: It’s all about symbolism though. It’s all about feminism and the body and…

Kate: The egg book just took it to another level. You’ve got to get this book.

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