Molly Goddard said that before this show at Christie’s auction house on King Street, the other occasions upon which she’d tended to visit were during the set up of displays. She elaborated: “It’s behind the scenes, when there are these masterpieces just lying on the floor: it’s kind of amazing to see and very exciting… which I guess in some way is connected to the collection.”
Goddard fashioned a fair few masterpieces of her own in a lineup that focused on nudging the mechanics of garments to the surface, turning them inside out in order to create a patina of production. She said she’d done her research in the National Theatre Costume Hire, examining the stitched clockwork of garments ranging in style from Regency to contemporary.
Long skirts were shirred at the hip to create drape down to edged froths of pale ruffled petticoat. This contrast device was especially stirring when used to edge the single vent of a black tailored jacket. The trademark tulle skirts were teamed with loosely corseted tops whose sheerness exposed the geography of boning and corsetry that defined their gentle geography. A dusty pink woolen cardigan was edged with a two-inch strip of satin, like some old granny blanket left bundled in the cupboard of a spare room. Washed out red rose prints used on more skirts and knitted into another cardigan—magenta paneled at the shoulder—added to the sense of comfortable, domestic nostalgia. Off-white quilted dresses came gridded with quilted beams, and the seams of checked denim pieces were traced in unfinished selvedge.
A precise excavation of the deeply familiar but also overlooked, this was a quietly masterful collection. Said Goddard: “What I enjoy most is when I get really stuck in to how to make clothes; the techniques and the fabrics and the fit.” That pleasure in Goddard’s process was evident in its result.
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