Elouise Zaharia
Elouise Zaharia is a unisex designer based in London. Her bold designs empower to unapologetically be yourself. Each piece is a definition of craftsmanship based on a rich Romanian heritage and embodies a mindful approach to ethical and sustainable manufacturing.
Zaharia finds herself constantly exploring her surroundings for inspiration as a reminder of living in the present and connectivity with the environment.
Challenging the pressure of social norms and consumerism. Her approach to design seeks to bring awareness of the true meaning of covering our bodies. She aims for a deeper appreciation of mindful artistic visions as a legacy for future generations.
Effects of Technological Unemployment – How technological over-consumerism cause human working force to become redundant. This project explored the positives and negatives of technological use and its effects on our physical and mental health. A major concern is also the depreciation of skills and craftsmanship. As a result Zaharia chose to celebrate their heritage and use the hand craft of Romanian Point Lace in this collection. Zaharia presents a hand made contemporary piece that celebrates all body shapes and sizes. As always, up-cycled materials are integrated for added points to sustainability.
Double Ode to Craftmanship: Crochet and Tailoring – This line-up is part of the second collection developed under Effects of Technological Unemployment. Unlike the first collection where Zaharia approached the development as a colour therapy and cocoon comfortability, the second collection means to raise awareness in a more accentuated way and double point the benefits of hand crafted techniques and combined Romanian Point Lace with Bespoke Tailoring.
Stratum Q: Connecting Nature with Technology through Festivals – This outfit is one of the pieces from the Unisex collection developed for the Stratum Q collaborative project. As a Unisex designer, Zaharia thoroughly enjoys the role and made the best out of an environment full of creatives. All materials used have been Up-cycled: curtains, e-waste, fabric off cuts and packaging. They all came together with accents of hot print collages of my digital print.
Puckered Seams Project: Distorted realities – The shirt of 16 shirts. In this project Zaharia explored the idea of how the reality is reflected by different types of materials and surfaces, in correlation with human perspectives. The pattern cutting has been especially created to reflect folds and accommodate the bias cutting of each piece that has been intentionally distorted during assembly. As materials, Zaharia used a collection of 16 white school shirts that have been dyed with turmeric and exposed to rust. The shirts have been cut without unpicking to reduce waste and add extra texture to the final outcome. Main panels have been created by patching together pieces that kept the original shape. Although it has proved to be very challenging to constantly fit and adapt, the result reflects struggles of the human perception of the reality.
Methodical Design Project: Spiralling Consumerism – Following Hundertwasser's principles and activism for environmental issues, Zaharia approached the theme of Spiralling Consumerism as a contemporary issue that needs to be addressed. The pattern cutting methods reflects the idea of spiralling into a frenzy and intends to affect the wearer's ability to move. It speaks of how our actions put pressure on to ourselves and the environment. The curved jetted pockets are inserted in the spiral and feature oversize pocket bags that are intended to be filled with shopping's to enhance the volume and weight down the wearer, therefore interfering with comfortability and mobility.