Gareth Pugh

English-born fashion designer Gareth Pugh is globally recognized for his approach to redefining modern luxury. Educated at London’s Central Saint Martins, Pugh creates “wearable sculptures,” with experimental forms, volumes, and fabrics as his signature aesthetic. Pugh made his London Fashion Week debut in 2005. He later won the ANDAM Fashion Award, presenting his first show in Paris in September 2008. He presented his first menswear collection in January 2009 and remained on the Paris schedule for the next six years. In 2015, Pugh celebrated the 10th anniversary of his label with a triumphant return to London Fashion Week, with Vogue Runway describing his spring/summer 2016 show as “perhaps his best collection ever.”

Pugh has worked with some of the most popular artists of our time—including Beyoncé, Lady Gaga, and Rihanna—and with major global cultural institutions, most recently exhibiting at the Costume Institute’s summer exhibition Manus x Machina at the Metropolitan Museum of Art in New York. Widely considered a leading proponent of fashion film and new technology, Pugh frequently collaborates with creative forces from opera, film, theater, and dance. He designed costumes for the opera Eliogabalo, which opened at the Palais Garnier in Paris in 2016 and recently worked on a major new digital media project with photographer and filmmaker Nick Knight, choreographer Wayne McGregor, and set designer Es Devlin, that launched during London Fashion Week in September.

In honor of SAIC’s Fashion Resource Center’s (FRC) 30th anniversary, Pugh will discuss his practice with Gillion Carrara, founding Director and Adjunct Professor in the Departments of Fashion Design and Art History, Theory, and Criticism, and Caroline Bellios, Assistant Director of the Fashion Resource Center and Adjunct Associate Professor in Fashion Design. Founded in 1987, the FRC maintains a unique hands-on collection of innovative late 20th- and 21st-century designer garments and an extensive reference collection. The FRC provides a creative and educational environment to explore progressive achievements in the world of dress and fashion. 

Twelve looks from Gareth Pugh's Autumn/Winter 2017 collection will be on view in SAIC's Department of Fashion Design's display cases, October 23 - November 10, located on the 7th floor of 36 S. Wabash Ave.