Somewhere in between Jean-Paul Gaultier’s iconic couture collections and Marlies Dekkers’ designer lingerie, there’s Chromat Garments: a cutting-edge structural design label that brings avant-garde fashion design to the surface. Behind the label is 27-year-old Becca McCharen, an Architecture graduate from small-town Southern Virginia, who’s fascination for structural fashion led her to found her own line in 2008. From editorial spreads in Vogue Italia‘s September issue and NYLON magazine, to the cover of Iconography and Blink and loyal fan Nicki Minaj’s body, Chromat’s cages and corsets are quickly making their mark across the fashion hemisphere. McCharen’s most recent Spring/Summer 2012 collection features an impressive array of ’caged’ lingerie, swimwear, dresses and headpieces, all dreamed up from her Brooklyn studio. We Jumped at the chance to ask the young designer some questions, at which Becca spoke to us about scaffolding, witches, gothic churches, Tumblr obsessions and rollerskating.
Coming from a background in architecture and urban design, what made you take the leap into the fashion world?
While I was a student in architecture school, my college job was as a seamstress in the drama department’s costume shop. There we sewed elaborate Victorian bustles and corsets and incredible period pieces. I started making my own clothes and eventually wanted to start doing more cohesive projects on my own, so I started Chromat as a way to organize my fashion ideas by season.
What first inspired you to go in the direction of cages and corsets?
I’m obsessed with building scaffolding. I love the Centre Pompidou in Paris— the way the architects pulled all the interior functions of the building and displayed them on the exterior. In this way, the pieces I make with Chromat are a way of pulling all the interior elements of a dress and displaying them on the outside, creating scaffolding for the body using the technical intricacies of undergarments.
Off the top of your head, what has been one of the best moments of starting Chromat Garments and watching it grow?
I’ll never forget the first time I saw Nicki Minaj wearing one of my cages on The Jimmy Kimmel show. I had no idea she had a Chromat piece. I got a call the next day, while I was quietly working in a coffee shop, from the owner of the store in LA who had sold her the cage saying that Nicki Minaj had performed on national TV wearing it! It was the first time a celebrity had worn a piece, and I’ve always been a big fan of Nicki Minaj, so it was surreal. The first thing I did was call my mom.
Worst moment?
Working long hours and weekends while all my friends go out and play!
You seem to get your inspiration from very specific places, yet the pieces you design are rather avant-garde and conceptual. How do you usually go about your design process and how does your background in architecture come into play?
Architecture school taught me the process of design. I always do research first, pulling out buildings I’m inspired by and forming a mood for the collection. Then when I sketch and drape out the lines, I’m always citing those forms and ideas in the construction. I’m always thinking about the topography of the human body as my site, and I try to enhance interesting parts of the body with structure.
Do you have a certain person in mind when you’re designing?
I do think about different types of women and the mood of those characters when I design different seasons. The most recent collection, for Spring/Summer 2012, was inspired by the incredibly ornate Roman Catholic Church near my studio, the devout hooded women who walk by my windows while I work, and of course pagan rituals and the underworld. So for that season I was thinking about nuns and witches, respectively.
Has relocating to New York City had an influence on your inspirations or design process at all?
Definitely. Relocating to NYC last year has catapulted Chromat into a new realm. Being able to connect with stylists, photographers, journalists, buyers and Chromat wearers has been such a great experience. It is very inspiring to work in a city where everyone devotes themselves to their craft. Living here has made me more of a workaholic than ever!
Now that fashion week has passed once again, what does an average day look like for you?
The schedule is so cyclical. Sometimes all I do is work on producing and shipping orders for weeks at a time. Sometimes I’m designing for the next season or editing photos from a photoshoot or planning another photoshoot. This week, my average day will probably be: wake up, review all my internet spots (Tumblr is my new favorite), work on orders with my team of interns, source materials for the next collection, get the Spring/Summer lookbooks reprinted and hopefully work on a few beginning samples for Autum/Winter 12!
Chromat Garments are often shown in avant-garde fashion spreads or worn on stage, though from your blog it’s clear you can wear them in everyday life. What’s your favorite way to style your pieces?
I love wearing the underwire cages over dresses to give them shape and some interesting lines. I also have a large collar piece called the Shoji Necklace that I love wearing in the winter because I can tuck a warm scarf inside it!
Images provided by Chromat Garments
Nicki Minaj is a loyal fan, and your work has been seen on the likes of Nicole Scherzinger, Kelly Rowland, Kat Graham and in pretty much every magazine that counts. Who would you love to see your garments on next?
BJORK!!!! She’s my all-time ultimate hero. She was wearing crazy stage costumes by Alexander McQueen long before I knew his name or his work. She is constantly experimenting and creating whole new worlds with each new album she releases. I only hope my collections can someday be as diverse and creative.
You’ve said you’re inspired by fashion blogs and street style, and you keep a blog yourself about the chromat process. Which blogs do you visit the most and what do you think of the influence of blogs on the fashion industry?
I love fashion blogs. Fashion bloggers have changed the fashion world significantly. Print magazines will always be nice to have around, but in my daily life I rely on fashion blogs and websites for all my fashion news. I always look to Susie Bubble as one of the personal style and fashion blogging pioneers and I love Fashion Gone Rogue for editorials. The Cut blog, New York Magazine’s fashion news site, is hilarious. I love how Tavi at Style Rookie is so into feminism, zines and riot grrrl culture. I’m also really obsessed with Tumblr right now. The feeds I subscribe to are all strictly visual and I’m always changing my feeds based on what I want to be inspired by, like right now I’m looking at lots of lingerie and collage art Tumblr pages.
What are some of your favorite hang-out spots in ‘the city’?
Karaoke at the old punk hangout Trash Bar, grinding to live drummers at Bembe, rollerskating to Michael Jackson at the Riverside park in Harlem, picnics on the Highline and seeing all the crazy club kids turn out on Sundays at Vandam and Tuesdays at Le Bain!
What’s currently on your ‘most played’ playlist?
Mapei’s song “Leader of the Pack,” Spankrock, Salem, Kreayshawn, Defsound’s Loose Change Volume 9 mixtape and Bjork’s new album Biophilia.
Check out Becca McCharen’s blog about her design process here, and find out where to get your hands on something Chromat here.
2 Comments on "Designer Spotlight: Becca McCharen of Chromat Redefines Wearable Art"
What an insight survey, I love your article.
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