The designer behind this year’s World of Wearable Arts (WOW) Supreme Award-winning garment says she was inspired to create the piece after seeing an abundance of “high vis” during a trip to the South Island.
US-based designer Grace DuVal took out the coveted award with her garment Curves Ahead — a piece made from reflective construction signs with a striking road-cone headpiece.
DuVal told Breakfast she had been working on the winning piece for seven years, and seeing it brought to life on the stage at the annual Wellington event “just means everything to me”.
“I’ve been entering WOW on and off since 2009, and I’ve looked up to every supreme winner who’s come before me. To hear my name called and to be among those is unbelievable, of course.
“To see it go from being shoved into my tiny little studio in Boston to being on this global stage on this massive arena, it’s just monumentally meaningful,” she said.
DuVal said she was inspired to create the piece when she saw “all of this high vis” during a trip to the South Island in 2017.
“These people covered in high vis as well as the cones and that juxtaposed against the natural neon of the landscape was just so captivating to me, both in terms of its visual aesthetic and also kind of the power of seeing people rebuilding and coming together to make something.
“I was thinking about kind of what happens in the wake of a catastrophe, and for me, sometimes after everything has fallen apart or collapsed, all we have are the dreams of what can be in the future.”
She said WOW was the “perfect home for me and my work”.
“There is literally no other place in the world that combines fashion and art in the way that this show does, and so it’s such a perfect venue to show off the ideas I have in my head.”
In 2023, DuVal won the WOW Designer Development Award which allowed her to begin researching 3D printing, which she was already planning to incorporate into her next piece.
“Ideas for next year’s WOW have already started, and I have emails to send and we’re going to start making it!” she laughed.