Design Trends: Spring/Summer 2019

Discover the colours, textures, shapes, and places that inspired my latest spring collection.

I love a mood board to collate my inspiration and create a visual theme for every new collection or bag I design. The images in a mood board define the elements of colour, texture, colour harmony, and pattern, for all my collections. They take me quite a while to put together, but it’s an essential part of the creative process and so much fun!

People often ask what inspires me. Everything and everyone can be a source of inspiration. I sometimes get inspired by a single image, a colour, a season of the year, a tradition, or a place I’ve visited. So many things provide such fantastic sources for inspiration, especially in Italy.

Last spring my family and I went on a road trip to Caserta, Sorrento, on the Amalfi Coast, and some picturesque towns in the Puglia region. As you’ll see from the images below, the trip had a huge influence in this season’s inspiration. The bold colours, the rock formations, the local ceramics and flowers, and the traditional architecture, are some of the things I fell in love with.

DESIGN INSPIRATION SPRING / SUMMER '19

The image that speaks to me the most is the one with the off white stone building with the magenta coloured Bougainvillea because it shows the contrast between the traditional white stone architecture of Puglia, the cerulean blue tones of the sky, and the the bright colours of nature. It gives me a feeling of peace and calm with a jolt of pure bliss. Of all the regions I’ve visited in Italy, Puglia is the one that is most inline with my design aesthetic - minimal design, warm whites with a splash of bright colours. I’m curious, which image is your favourite and what feelings does it evoke for you?

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Minimalism is an appreciation of space, form and function.

The basis for all my design decisions starts with a blank canvas and a lot of questions. I guess it's a lot like designing your home from scratch. First you add the structure, the walls, the doors, the windows, and then you tackle one room at a time to add the interiors. You consider the function of the room, is it for cooking, eating, sleeping, relaxing? Then you figure out what you need in each room to serve its purpose.

The way I design a bag, is pretty similar. I think about the shapes I see, the lines, the colours. Does it have a flap, a fold, a right edge? Is it structured or soft around the edges? How will I wear it? Across the body or by hand? What will I use it to carry? Is it for work, for a wedding, for the weekend?

And just like that, I start drawing, cutting, assembling pieces of cardboard to make the first paper sample. Once I have the dimensions right, we transfer the design to leather to see what it will look like in 3D. This is the most exciting part of the process because I can immediately tell whether it will work, whether it needs a few tweaks or has to go in the bin! I have quite a few samples that never make it out of my studio. It's frustrating when a design doesn't work, but most likely it will be the basis for another design I love.

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