Alexander McQueen and Ffasiwn Stiwdio’s community project celebrates creativity in South Wales
Ffasiwn Stiwdio, the project founded by creative director and filmmaker Charlotte James and French documentary photographer Clémentine Schneidermann, was born out of their shared resistance to passive teaching, limp modelling and objectifying photography. For the past six years, the duo have been working with young people growing up in James’ Welsh hometown of Merthyr Tydfil and the nearby town of Brynmawr, co-producing fashion shoots with them in a “long-term creative relationship embedded in the community.”
South Wales – its verdant landscape, literature and craft – was the wellspring of inspiration for Alexander McQueen’s creative director, Sarah Burton, for her ‘heroic’ AW20 collection. When she encountered the work of James and Schneidermann, conversations quickly matured into an active educational community project, beginning in June 2020, when the UK was lurching into an uncomfortable, momentary freedom after its severe lockdown.
For several months (when it was safe to do so), the renowned fashion house sent members of their embroidery, studio and education teams to Blaenau Gwent, holding a series of fashion, embroidery and photography workshops for local young people. The tangible, hands-on experience in making images and clothes culminated in a stellar four-day shoot by James and Schneidermann, with participants, as well as their friends and family, photographed everywhere from Blaina to Ogmore-by-Sea, Brynmawr to Blaenavon.
A year later, the project has been published as a book with additional sketches, writing, research and embroidery by those involved inside, alongside a short fashion film and documentary. Altogether, it is a joyful celebration of the promise of youth, what real creativity and collaboration with a community looks like, and marks Burton’s continued commitment to extending fashion education to school-age, college and university students across the UK.
“We’ve all been inspired by the experience of being able to make a practical connection with this collaboration with young people in Wales,” reflects Burton. “Community values and the belief in offering creative opportunities to young people are at the heart of what we believe at Alexander McQueen, and this record of what we all learned together last year is a testament to what transformative things can happen everywhere when empowering equal access to creative ideas.”
