What if fashion comes back down to earth? Designing the rediscovery of matter

The contribution investigates the relationship between fashion and the earth, interpreted as a natural element that brings fashion towards a more material dimension. In the theoretical perspective of posthumanism and new materialism, some global case studies are investigated. The relationship with the earth can be traced back to two approaches. The first one, as emerges from the analysis of some fashion shows by Marine Serre, Saint Laurent, and Jacquemus, is configured by the use of the earth as imaginary, as an element of storytelling and as an environment in which fashion shows itself. The second one, identified through the analysis of Hussein Chalayan’s The Tangent Flows, the Plant and Algae T-Shirt by Vollebak, the mud silk, Paula Ulargui Escalona’s graduation thesis, and the biomaterial obtained by Thai designer Khajornsak Nakpan, more clearly represents a form of collaboration between human and non-human in the creation or alteration of fabrics and materials for fashion.