The London design gallery “19 Greek Street ” presented “‘Ricreare: Life After The Catwalk “, a unique collaboration between Danish designer Nina Tolstrup and celebrated fashion brand Marc by Marc Jacobs, to mark the official launch of Tolstrup’s “Re-Imagined Collection” during the Salone.
After the success of the Re-Imagined Chair during the London Design Festival 2012, 19 Greek Street is currently working with Nina Tolstrup to develop a complete furniture collection including sofas, daybeds, dining chairs, low chairs, and a variety of tables, all bearing the same aesthetics and honouring the same values of craft, up-cycling and sustainability as the original Re-Imagined Chair.
A limited edition range of the Re-Imagined Collection has been developed in collaboration with Marc by Marc Jacobs and is being exhibited at the fashion brand’s showroom in Brera, Milan.
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The launch party was held at the Marc by Marc Jacobs store, and was supported by Grazia Magaone – which launched its’ new “Grazia Casa” masthead and first issue.
at Piazza del Carmine 6 Milan
In keeping with Re-Imagined Chair’s philosophy, which employs recycled and discarded materials giving them a second life, this new collaboration, aptly entitled ‘Ricreare: Life After The Catwalk’, will feature a range of pieces upholstered using fabrics from previous Marc by Marc Jacobs’ collections.
Re-Imagined collection
As with Tolsreup’s previous design production, there is a message contained in the Re-Imagined series.
Tolstrup wants to encourage us to look again at the unloved furniture in our homes, streets and markets and to make it anew. This is not just a sustainable approach to design and making, but a social one too; through working together and pooling resources we can re-imagine the second-hand and redesign our everyday surroundings
Conceived and created by Nina Tolstrup, the Re-Imagined is a project born out of understanding of the importance of resourcefulness.
It builds upon the designer’s interests in usefulness and re-using the existing, and speaks of her ability to see the potential in the overlooked and forgotten.
Following the launch, the full Re-imagined Collection will be returned to London as part of the “19 Greek Street” gallery’s permanent collection.
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About Marc Jacob
Marc Jacobs (born April 9, 1963) is an American fashion designer.
He is the head designer for Marc Jacobs, as well as Marc by Marc Jacobs, a diffusion line, with more than 200 retail stores in 80 countries.
He has been the creative director of the French design house Louis Vuitton since 1997. Jacobs was on Time Magazine’s “2010 Time 100” list of the 100 most influential people in the world, and ranked number 14 on Out Magazine’s 2012 list of “50 Most Powerful Gay Men and Women in America”.
Marc Jacobs was born to a non-observant Jewish family in New York City.
When he was seven, his father, an agent at the William Morris agency, died.
His mother, who remarried three times, was “mentally ill” and “didn’t really take care of her kids”, according to Jacobs.
As a teenager, he went to live with his paternal grandmother on the Upper West Side, in an apartment in the Majestic on Central Park West.
He graduated from the High School of Art and Design in 1981 and studied at the Parsons School of Design in New York.
While at Parsons in 1984, Jacobs won the Perry Ellis Gold Thimble Award, Chester Weinberg Gold Thimble Award, and Design Student of the Year Award.
At age 15, Jacobs worked as a stockboy at Charivari, a now-defunct avant-garde clothing boutique in New York City.
While still at Parsons, Jacobs designed and sold his first line of hand-knit sweaters.
He also designed his first collection for Reuben Thomas, Inc., under the Sketchbook label. With Robert Duffy, Jacobs’ creative collaborator, and business partner since the mid-1980s, he formed Jacobs Duffy Designs Inc.
In 1986, backed by Onward Kashiyama USA, Inc., Jacobs designed his first collection bearing the Marc Jacobs label.
In 1987, Jacobs was the youngest designer to have ever been awarded the fashion industry’s highest tribute, the Council of Fashion Designers of America’s Perry Ellis Award for “New Fashion Talent”.
In 1988, Jacobs and Duffy joined the women’s design unit of Perry Ellis after its founder, Perry Ellis, had died as vice president and president, respectively. In addition, Jacobs oversaw the design of the various women’s licensees.
In 1992, the Council of Fashion Designers of America awarded Jacobs with The Women’s Designer of the Year Award. In the same year, he designed a “grunge” collection for Perry Ellis, leading to his dismissal.
In the fall of 1993, Jacobs Duffy Designs Inc. launched their own licensing and design company: Marc Jacobs International Company, L.P.
In 1994, Jacobs produced his first full collection of menswear.
In 1997, Jacobs was appointed Louis Vuitton’s creative director, where he created the company’s first ready-to-wear clothing line. Jacobs has collaborated with many popular artists for his Louis Vuitton collections, including Stephen Sprouse, Takashi Murakami and most recently American artist Richard Prince and rapper Kanye West.
In the spring of 2001, Jacobs introduced his secondary line, Marc by Marc Jacobs.
In 2006, Jacobs started a new line of body-splash fragrances in affordable huge ten-ounce bottles which are distributed by Coty. First only being sold in perfume boutiques, they have become more and more popular during the recent years. In 2007 filmmaker Loïc Prigent released a documentary film about Jacobs entitled Marc Jacobs and Louis Vuitton.
In February 2008, Jacobs was accused of plagiarizing a scarf design created in the 1950s by Swedish designer Gösta Olofsson. Jacobs settled the matter by offering monetary compensation to Olofsson’s son.
In 2009, Jacobs launched a shirt, sold at his stores, demanding the legalization of gay marriage.
In May 2009, Jacobs co-hosted, with fashion model Kate Moss, a “model and muse”-themed gala for the New York City Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Costume Institute.
In February 2010, Jacobs sued Ed Hardy for infringing on the designs of one of his embroidered handbags.
In the course of the Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Berlin in July 2011 Jacobs was the patron of the young talent award “Designer for Tomorrow by Peek & Cloppenburg”. The five finalists were selected by Jacob and the juryboard and received a personal coaching by Jacobs. The juryboard and Jacobs appointed the winner of 2011 during the DfT award show.
In August 2011, it was reported that Jacobs may succeed John Galliano as creative director of Christian Dior. According to The Daily Telegraph, Jacobs “firmly laid to rest rumours that he was to move to Christian Dior” in January 2012, but rumours prevail.
In February 2013, Jacobs was named the new creative director for Diet Coke. In honor of the brand’s 30th anniversary, Jacobs will spend one year where he is slated to give the brand a “stylish and light-hearted” makeover.
In March 2013, the New York Daily News revealed that the “faux fur” used in many Marc Jabobs garments is actually the fur from raccoon dogs from China.
About Nina Tolstrup
Nina Tolstrup, a London based Danish designer was trained at the prestigious Les Ateliers (Ecole Nationale Supérieure de Création Industrielle) in Paris and has a BA in Marketing from the Business School in Copenhagen.
She founded Studiomama in 2000 and true to Nina’s Scandinavian roots, simplicity and integrity are the trademarks of her design; a pared-down, contemporary but characterful aesthetic combined with a democratic belief in good design for all go a long way to explaining the timeless and unpretentious qualities of the studio’s work.
But whilst Studiomama’s work can be simple, honest and minimal, it is always playful, irreverent and humorous.
Studiomama has pioneered open source by pushing the limits of material recycling, extending product life and exploring new forms of up cycling, whilst simultaneously challenging conventional business models and distribution methods.
Apart from designing, Nina is a consulting professor at the London branch of Syracuse University, curator of the Danish Craft.
