GRADUATION SHOW OF THE ROYAL DANISH ACADEMY
Kristin Sigus delivered one of the most theatrical looks of the show, a reminder of how graduation fashion often leans towards spectacle over wearability.
BETWEEN FASHION AND MASQUERADE
Text and photos by Max
A fashion show for newly graduated designers is by definition a meeting of intention and potential. For some, it marks the beginning of an independent label; for others, a gateway to an internship. But what unites them is that this is where fashion must show what it wants, and what it dares. At the graduation show of the Royal Danish Academy on 6 August 2024, the ambitions were high, but the expressions were strikingly diverse. Between technical finesse and textile overload, between elegance and excess, a clear tension emerged: between fashion and masquerade.
WEARABILITY VERSUS THEATRICALITY
Although several designers demonstrated confidence in materials, construction, and colour, it was often unclear whether the aim was to create clothing, or merely ideas about clothing. This is a legitimate position. But it is also a problematic one, especially when the institution simultaneously claims to educate designers who can make a living from their craft. As the Royal Danish Academy puts it: "We educate designers who can shape future practice through aesthetic, critical, and sustainable approaches" (source: kglakademi.dk). But if sustainability includes longevity and wearability, how do the most theatrical designs support, or contradict, this ambition?
This tension is not new. As early as the beginning of the 20th century, haute couture balanced art and function. Madeleine Vionnet worked with cuts that followed the body, while Elsa Schiaparelli created visual effects that belonged more to the art scene than the wardrobe. The dilemma remains, but still demands reinvention.
Madeleine Vionnet at the top, Elsa Schiaparelli at the bottom.
At the opposite end of the spectacle stood designers like Mai Sakamoto, who, with a strong sense of silhouette, colour composition, and textile poetry, presented a collection that was both immediately wearable and aesthetically ambitious. Sakamoto's universe was full of movement and visual lightness, without compromising on detail or character. Several of her looks had clear commercial potential, not in the sense of mass appeal, but in the sense that they could be worn. And that makes a difference.
A selection of looks from Mai Sakamoto’s graduate collection, which stood out for its refined interplay of colour, print and layering - wearable, expressive, and confidently composed. The designer herself appears in the bottom right image.
Design graduate Mai Sakamoto
Designers such as Johanna Inger Kristensen, Trine Nielsen, and Yijing Wang also presented individual styles where aesthetics and usability met convincingly. Not all of their collections were cohesive, but they contained moments of clarity, where clothing does not drown out the body but elevates it. The same could be said, in fragments, of Sarah Blicher Bek and Frederik Daugberg, where the simple, structural, and textile-focused designs worked best.
Johanna Inger Kristensen, Trine Nielsen, Trine Nielsen, Yijing Wang, Sarah Blicher Bek, Sarah Blicher Bek, Frederik Daugberg and Frederik Daugberg
Where some offered garments that invited use, others presented expressions that resisted the very notion of wearability. Several designers employed costume, activism, and performativity as deliberate strategies. This is not inherently problematic, but it becomes so when fabric loses form and concept overshadows craftsmanship. One example was Kristin Sigus, who, with T-shirts printed with "I only wear Trashion" (a portmanteau of "trash" and "fashion") and billowing waste aesthetics, created a kind of textile protest, yet nothing truly wearable. Other collections, by Victor Krings, Juliane Rignel Jørgensen, and Kathrine Kirk, struggled with stylistic coherence and left more questions than answers. At times, the proclamations were loud, but the garments struggled to articulate a clear message.
Kristin Sigus, Kristin Sigus, Victor Krings, Juliane Rignel Jørgensen, Kathrine Kirk, Kathrine Kirk, Asger Beyer and Edith Wallin
This trend is not unique to Denmark. International fashion weeks in London and Paris have, in recent years, revealed a similar polarisation: on one side, wearable minimalism, often driven by sustainability (see: The Row, Lemaire, Jil Sander); on the other, experimental fashion as bodily theatre (for example, Comme des Garçons or Richard Quinn). The Royal Danish Academy's graduation show mirrors this tension, but in some cases may lack the aesthetic refinement that makes even the experimental credible.
It is easy to be seduced by concept and statement. But it requires greater courage to design something that someone might actually wear, and which still contains identity, innovation, and an eye for quality. It is in this balance that future fashion designers must find their footing. Because fashion is not merely an idea. It is a relationship. To the body, to the world, to others.
This year's graduation show revealed both promise and pitfalls. And in that field of tension, the question arose: is this the beginning of a new wave in Danish fashion, or a parade of unresolved formal experiments?
Perhaps the real question is not whether fashion should be wearable or conceptual, but how design education can prepare graduates to move between both with intent. The answer will not be found on the catwalk, but in the wardrobe.
A voluminous explosion of pink tulle and rosettes – part fairytale, part provocation. This look typifies the kind of spectacle that challenges the boundary between fashion design and performance art. Design by Asger Beyer
From behind, the dress reveals its sculptural volume and surprising pragmatism, worn with sneakers and anchored by a floor-sweeping braid. A reminder that fantasy and functionality are rarely far apart on the graduate runway. Design by Asger Beyer
