Ella Haberlach

The concept of the designer

seelenkleid, translated meaning ‘soul dress’, is a new women’s wear label founded in 2007 by German designer Ella Haberlach. Her artisanal and paradoxical approach to design combines the floaty perfection of ideal beauty with the embellishments of a horrific sludge. Ella’s collections predominantly deal with the human desire to depart from everyday conventions. She translates this quest for something special, this escape from the everyday into new silhouettes, colours and materials. Silicone applications and random burn-out printing are aimed at reflecting the inconsistency of feelings and the relationship between man and his environment. The uncontrollable destruction of fabrics creates both, a contrast and a bridge between the skin and textile surface.

seelenkleid collections are like personal diaries that define the designers´ vision. They are against conformity and without the cosmetic effect of fashion. In the designer’s statement, she acknowledges that „the basic idea is based on dealing with identity changes and the war of two realities – the earthly and the imaginary“. seelenkleid somehow lies in a gap between reality and fantasy. Needs that arise in the real world can only be satisfied by elements of the imagination. Ella Haberlach seeks for the extraordinary and introduces it to everyday life.

threads and pins

I've found inspiring from the work done with threads and pins by a British Designer - Debbie Smyth's. Threads have being stretched in between the pins which has created like a pen drawn image onto the board. I like how the lines are continuous giving you insight into the construction of the drawing. And threads and pins work always reminds me that it's related to fashion as thread and pins are both strongly emblematic to the construction of a garment.


an accurate scale drawing of electrical pylons composed of threads stretched between pins.

Taking inspiration from the artist's work, I've explored the same onto my tiny mannequin shadow. I'm intended to bring out the flatten boring shadow by adding some interesting texture and layers through the threads stretched between the pins.

Chinese Folk Art - shadow play

Just another interesting shadow art I've been thinking of, which could be as an inspiring source for me on how a shadow could actually be dressed up.
This folk art is widely spread, which uses the folk handiworks: leather silhouette figure and highligting background. Shadow play is an ancient form of storytelling and entertainment using opaque, often articulated figures in front of an illuminated backdrop to create the illusion of moving images.



the scene on the stage of shadow play.


artists are working at the backstage.

response to shadow

My response to shadow is pretty straight forward, where first things came into my mind when we talk about shadow is something always follow us. Where everything exist in the world has a shadow as their companion all the time.
Shadow aren't pretty, they're unconscious, simple, a word without sound and colour, a dark object, seamless. They've always been treated as a mimic/minor character of everything. They shared the same intention as the mirror (reflection) but in an unconscious, colourless way.
In this project, shadow is going to make a twist, as where we are now giving more attention upon them. I've written down some questions as a guide for myself of how to explore the beauty of shadow.

- Is shadow always act as a mimic/ minor character and we are always the main part?
- Can it actually be more interesting than being a dark no detail object?
- Could we apply some colours onto the shadow?
- How to make the shadow look more interesting and alive?
- How shadow could attract more than a glance from us?
- Can shadow dressed up as well?

My intention in this project is to make the shadow looks stronger and is able to take over as a main character in our life, to attract the attention of the viewers.

And i am amazed from a series of photos taken by 'Russ and Reyn' a New York based photography team, where they've smartly applied the beauty of shadow onto their pictures. Making the extraordinary shadow out of the ordinary shadow. They created real life shadow puppets and mix of real people and shadows makes for a really interesting composition.

Amazing Animated Optical Illusions

the amazing relationship in between the lines and light, making the stood still object moving.

shadow - our companion ever

ignorantly cute one afraid of her own shadow :)

workshop 3 - shadow

this week we had a photograpy lighting room, working and explore with the shadow from 3 different ways - space, opacity and movement.

space - explore the relationship between the object , distance and the light.
shadow interpreted the hands work where we barely tell what's the hands trying to work out without looking into the shadow.

opacity - explore with different thickness/colour paper.
the cliff shadow wasn't in a gray tone anymore after we'd added a transparency green paper against the light.

movement - explore with the ways of creating movement through shadow by changing the lighting distances and angles.

i'm amazed by the shadow movement work from group 3 - (Jacinta, Sharlee, Nat & Sophie)
they've made the shadow moved through different angles of lighting (slowly rose above the lighting)



and our group (me, jemmy, vera and sarah) was more likely explore our shadow work through the space. reviewing different shadow outcomes from different angle of the object. outcome 1 - temple shadow from front view outcome 2 - nun shadow from the side.