The exhibition examines fashion as a design process and offers insights into the diverse steps involved in creating fashion that range from brainstorming to the finished product, from assessing materials and textile techniques to presenting the garments on the catwalk and in photo shootings. The project is a collaboration between the Kunstgewerbemuseum (Museum of Decorative Arts), the weißensee kunsthochschule berlin, the Trier University of Applied Sciences, the ESAA Duperré in Paris (École Supérieure des Arts Appliqués), the ESMOD (École supérieure des arts et techniques de la mode) in Paris and the Apolda European Design Awards.

Inspired by the Bauhaus as a social utopia, the young designers involved in the project have taken on the task of using their work to influence social developments. In the Bauhaus tradition they are searching for forward-looking impulses to advance thinking surrounding fashion design while using their individual talents to come up with a broadly shared, resource-conscious and sustainable vision of fashion.

During a six-month work phase preceding the exhibition, the designs will be realised in collaboration with textile companies in Apolda, Thuringia, working in the manufactory tradition. In this context the participants actively explore the relationship between traditional techniques and innovative technologies in the textile industry, focusing in particular on discovering ways to creatively link handcrafted and machine-based production in design processes.

In workshops accompanying the exhibition, children and young adults will have the chance to explore the development process and test their own creativity.

The project is supported by the Bauhaus Fund of the German Federal Cultural Foundation.