Julian Scarry creates walking illustrations with his designs.
Perfect: What are your earliest memories of fashion?
Julian Scarry: My love for fashion stems from watching the glamorous women in my family get all dressed up to go out for dinner or the opera. I was mesmerised by watching them enter their rooms and emerge as these captivating, beautiful creatures, that radiated confidence because of the dresses they were wearing. I knew that that’s the emotion I wanted to let people feel when they wear my clothes.
Perfect: What references from art, design and culture are most significant to you and your work?
Julian Scarry: Most prevalent in my work is my reference to the human body. My father is a fantastic artist whose life drawings have sparked my interest for how artists capture the human form. Then, my obsession with Egon Schiele began and I eventually developed my own illustration style. Now I reference these lines in my dresses and silhouettes and essentially want to make people look like they are walking illustrations.
Perfect: What elements of your creative language do you think are most representative of you as a designer?
Julian Scarry: Definitely my passion for make-up and glamour. I myself love to transform and have just recently found a way of telling stories through images of myself printed on fabric. When doing my make-up I feel complete freedom, and in a time where we often feel restricted I thought it would be a beautiful way to integrate my emotions into my garments.
Perfect: From inspiration to construction, what does your creative process look like?
Julian Scarry: I often start just by sketching a design in my head, which then informs my references - art, photography, architecture, fashion, film. From then I start draping (my preferred way to work), and keep going back and forth between fabric and paper, essentially developing the garment. Lately I have found Photoshop an extremely helpful tool as I can collage pictures of my fittings onto my muse, quickly try different silhouettes or design details without having to physically recut everything about the design.
Whilst the garment is developing I constantly reference art for my prints and see what works for the dress and what doesn’t, and eventually a narrative starts to build that flows into the next design and so on. In the end it feels like puzzle pieces start coming together and things start to make sense, like solving a mystery. I love the whole process.
Perfect: What do you enjoy most about being a fashion designer?
Julian Scarry: I love bringing out the glamorous diva in people. Seeing how people feel completely different when they are wearing something you poured your entire soul into is so satisfying. Seeing a finalised garment and then looking back at the very first sketch and being reminded of the journey you went on to get to that point also brings me great joy. You feel invincible because you materialise something which only existed in your mind before. It’s magic!
Perfect: If you could dress anyone, dead or alive, in your designs who would it be?
Julian Scarry: I would love to have dressed David Bowie in the most glamorous gown. I think Freddie Mercury would look dashing in one too. Hopefully I get to see Lady Gaga, Tilda Swinton and Grace Jones in my designs some time in the future. Androgynous, glamorous individuals that embrace femininity.
