BURC AKYOL COLL 03 SUMMER SHOW, PALM GARDENS

What a year it has been! First a win of the Fashion Trust Arabia Prize (FTA) as a Turkish designer for the Guest Country award, then finalist as a French designer for the LVMH Prize, a growing community and you here, today, guest to my first show under our institution, the Paris Fashion Week. It’s enough to make one wonder or at least reflect on how it all happened. How did the desert road finally hit an oasis. Aridity never scared me though; I started my brand with nothing but what I could do with my hands and a survival instinct most kids of immigrant parents from the “banlieue” (fringes of an acknowledged Frenchness) form so early it becomes intrinsic to their character. This resilience is tree like, rooted deep and tall and tallness was key this summer, verticality was key. Was it Richard Serra’s East-West/West-East installation in the Brouq desert in Qatar where I was for the FTA that imprinted this want for black, steely heights in me or the constant conversation of my own East and West? Regardless, it’s a rather stormy internal talk at times, but I feel a reconciliation. Calme après la tempête? Hardly! Things are getting busier and busier and dress coded ceremonials and rituals become a thing I need getting used to for myself, dressing up in myself. Walk the talk as they say. This direct relation to my own designs has been the base of my process, I always tried my pieces on me first during fittings. I do this because that’s how you go from designer to wearer. Your d