Inspiration: Raphaelle H'Limi & Polka Dots

I am officially obsessed with this young woman's designs! From the first look at her SS14 collection presented at Paris fashion week, I'm absolutely hooked. The whimsical girly designs, soft fabrics, pastel colors, contrasted with the clean graphic lines, I love it! And later I found, like a crazy fan or stalker from her Pinterest folders and her designer profile at Avenue lifestyle (click here: Raphaelle HLimi of Hellopillow), that she has a graphic design background an dabbles in homeware design as well. Amazing!

Anyways, calming down, I would really like to comment on her interesting use of dots in her designs. I love polka dots, since a long time ago. To me, there's two things about it that attracts me, #1 the 60s retro era feel, which I love! And #2 it's graphic, straight and clean pattern which is easy to try, which is good for me when I wasn't as adventurous in my fashion choices then. The first female artist then truly opened my eye and imagination to polka dots used in totally unconventional manner, and scale, and color was Yayoi Kusama, when she did her collaboration with Louis Vuitton for one of their new bag collections:

In this case, I felt LV did a great job in transcending her artwork unto the bags and clothing. Personally, though I adore her spirit for art, the dots don't appeal to me that much. It's kind of creepy to me, like how they resemble octopus tentacles? So maybe quirky, but still nightmare-worthy-creepy.

Raphaelle does dots in a very different manner though. Non-possessive of space. Not really to me. Even in the MIST A RAY campaign below. Just shining quietly, like a star, like a prop (in her polka dot painted models in her SS14 campaign), seemingly fading into the background, but bright enough to induce interest.

RAPHAELLE H'LIMI // Mist A Ray A/W 13-14 from Frédéric Bussière

Her video here, or her designs, tend to focus around lightness; like the occasional mist that blows in your face from the models and her choice of fabrics. The sounds, movement (of lighting, mist, models), the lighting (dots), all lifts you into this state of floating, dreaming. 

This is one designer I'm keeping my eyes glued on. 

xoxo, 

Yuhan