The study of cymatics was the starting point of Iris van Herpen’s new couture collection. For the arts and letters types reading this, cymatics visualizes sound waves as evolving geometric patterns. Van Herpen didn’t use actual sounds or compositions to create her plissé dresses, she clarified backstage; rather, known patterns, easily Googled, informed the manner in which she pleated her creations. The subject matter also gave her an excuse to invite the Japanese musician Kazuya Nagaya to create a Zen bowl sound accompaniment for her installation. Amplified by microphones, the bell-like sounds reverberated inside the Eglise Réformée de l’Oratoire du Louvre setting, and the models, wearing tall wooden platforms and perched on stone plinths, moved their fragile arms expressively to the music.
The pair of dresses that flanked the sound bowl setup were made from silicone-coated handblown glass bubbles—thousands of them—or silicone-coated Swarovski water drop crystals. Both of them were technical feats and futuristic in their aspect, as worthy of the Met’s “Manus x Machina” as any of Van Herpen’s other pieces in that exhibition, but the former in particular struck you as rather performative, in the sense that a woman wearing it would have a hard time working a room in it. More interesting for its real-life potential was the experiment with Japanese organza woven from polymer threads five times thinner than human hair. Van Herpen used the Shibori technique to create a honeycomb-like, quilted effect on a short dress in the stuff that was practically weightless. Most compelling of all were the plisse, line-printed organza dresses. When one of the models picked up the hem of her generous skirt, you realized that the lines were straight. It was the pleating that created their snaking curves. Which brings us back to patterns and cymatics. You don’t have to know a lick about the subject to be seduced by those delicate, graceful gowns.
