We, as the Designer Interviews ("DI") had the distinct pleasure and opportunity to interview award-winning, most creative and innovative RONG ZHANG ("RZ").
Rong Zhang is a Chinese Womenswear Fashion Designer. Her collection is defined by its artistic fusion of craftsmanship, modern femininity, and youth culture influences with a sense of refined ease. Inspiration drawn from contemporary art, subculture is combined with an emphasis on tailoring and the manipulation of fabrics. Balanced between tradition and modernity, harmony and contradiction, Rong creates thought-provoking silhouettes through breaking the garment stereotype. Rong Zhang received her Bachelor degree in Womenwear from London Collage of Fashion in 2015. Using rich and geometrical patterns, the art of folding, creating volume through construction, Rong’s undergraduate collection has been featured in leading publications such as Vogue. Currently, Rong graduated from the Master Fashion Design Degree in School of the Art Institute of Chicago.
RONG ZHANG Designs
We are pleased to share with you original and innovative design work by RONG ZHANG.
Designer Interview of RONG ZHANG:
DI: Could you please tell us more about your art and design background? What made you become an artist/designer? Have you always wanted to be a designer?
RZ : Under the influence of my parents, who engage in trading children clothing, I have grown up with an unyielding interest in clothing color and fabric. I often painted the sketches of costumes in my imagination and sewed clothes for baby dolls. I steadfastly insist that clothes are alive in the hands of the owner's personality and designer’s ideas. After graduating from high school, I believed in my enduring passion in fashion design and strong spatial imagination. Therefore, I decided to give up the study of science and decided to get into costume design profession.
DI: Can you tell us more about your company / design studio?
RZ : I am a Chinese Womenswear Fashion Designer. My collection is defined by its artistic fusion of craftsmanship, modern femininity, and youth culture influences with a sense of refined ease.Balanced between tradition and modernity, harmony and contradiction, I creates thought-provoking silhouettes through breaking the garment stereotype. I received her Bachelor degree in Womenwear from London Collage of Fashion in 2015. Using rich and geometrical patterns, the art of folding, creating volume through construction, My undergraduate collection has been featured in leading publications such as Vogue. For the intricately crafted, multi-layered garments and explorations into digital printing, digital embroidery and weaving techniques, my collections has been selected for ‘The Chinese Festival’ Exhibition in London V&A Museum 2013, ‘1ndependent15’ Design Show in London 2015 and ‘The Costume Colloquium V-Restraint and Excess in Dress’ Exhibition in Florence 2016, ‘Midwest Fashion Week 2017’and ‘FashionX Runway Austin 2017’. In the past accolades have included ‘Raffles Design Institution First Year Scholarship’ (2010), ‘The top 15 Designer for Tomorrow Award’ (2015).
DI: What is "design" for you?
RZ : dig fresh idea from the normal life
DI: What kinds of works do you like designing most?
RZ : garment pieces, flyers
DI: What is your most favorite design, could you please tell more about it?
RZ : Vivienne Westwood's fashion. Her distinctive style of work, the control over the entire design and selection of good ideas greatly impressed me. It also taught me how to judge the beauty of a design through the mix of a clear concept and different clothing items combination.
DI: What was the first thing you designed for a company?
RZ : My womenswear collection of AW17 for the Austin Fashion Week
DI: What is your favorite material / platform / technology?
RZ : I like playing with different fabric and fine art materials. I have use acrylic to transform the paper pattern into acrylic pattern for part of material in my fashion collection, which is interesting.
DI: When do you feel the most creative?
RZ : go to the gallery
DI: Which aspects of a design do you focus more during designing?
RZ : the shape and construction, and the interesting way to play around texture
DI: What kind of emotions do you feel when your designs are realized?
RZ : Sense of accomplishment but stressful, since the designs still can be improved and better.
DI: What makes a design successful?
RZ : fresh， functional
DI: When judging a design as good or bad, which aspects do you consider first?
RZ : is this design fit for its customer?
DI: From your point of view, what are the responsibilities of a designer for society and environment?
RZ : lead a trend, make the life convenient
DI: How do you think the "design field" is evolving? What is the future of design?
RZ : the emerging of design will get faster, and connect with digital world
DI: When was your last exhibition and where was it? And when do you want to hold your next exhibition?
RZ : SAIC Design Show，chicagoI plan to attend an exhibition at China in 2018.
DI: Where does the design inspiration for your works come from? How do you feed your creativity? What are your sources of inspirations?
RZ : Inspiration drawn from contemporary art, subculture is combined with an emphasis on tailoring and the manipulation of fabrics. Balanced between tradition and modernity, harmony and contradiction, I am interesting to create thought-provoking silhouettes through breaking the garment stereotype.
DI: How would you describe your design style? What made you explore more this style and what are the main characteristics of your style? What's your approach to design?
RZ : An artistic fusion of craftsmanship, modern femininity, and youth culture influences with a sense of refined ease.
DI: Where do you live? Do you feel the cultural heritage of your country affects your designs? What are the pros and cons during designing as a result of living in your country?
RZ : I am born in China, the eastern culture has affected my design a lot, like the Chinese embroidery, costume and fabric. The traditional cultures of China has inspired my design and techniques, since I study fashion design at UK and US, which extend my vision.
DI: How do you work with companies?
RZ : I am doing design and development for fashion companies. At free time, I am working as a fashion design teacher to help student on portfolio and techniques.
DI: What are your suggestions to companies for working with a designer? How can companies select a good designer?
RZ : have a clear vision to the customer designed for
DI: Can you talk a little about your design process?
RZ : depends on each collection. Some collections I start with researching, but some collections I start with draping or sketching. Then transform 2D ideas into 3D
DI: Can you describe a day in your life?
RZ : a normal day but you can make it special
DI: Could you please share some pearls of wisdom for young designers? What are your suggestions to young, up and coming designers?
RZ : always reaching new things, not only in your field.
DI: From your perspective, what would you say are some positives and negatives of being a designer?
RZ : nice title, but stressful behind
DI: What is your "golden rule" in design?
RZ : self reflection
DI: What skills are most important for a designer?
RZ : researching and development
DI: Which tools do you use during design? What is inside your toolbox? Such as software, application, hardware, books, sources of inspiration etc.?
RZ : Photoshop, sketchbook
DI: Designing can sometimes be a really time consuming task, how do you manage your time?
RZ : pick up the spare time
DI: How long does it take to design an object from beginning to end?
RZ : really depends, can be one day or three month
DI: What is the most frequently asked question to you, as a designer?
RZ : What do you do as a designer?
DI: What was your most important job experience?
RZ : working at J.Mendel company at NYC
DI: Who are some of your clients?
RZ : Actress Sharon ZhangSinger Elaine WangDJ Princess Julia
DI: What type of design work do you enjoy the most and why?
RZ : I like dong design development, to make 2D into 3D
DI: What are your future plans? What is next for you?
RZ : learning marketing skills and set up personal design brand
DI: Do you work as a team, or do you develop your designs yourself?
RZ : I develop my design myself
DI: Do you have any works-in-progress being designed that you would like to talk about?
RZ : The ideology of my latest is that when you erase the traces, you destroy beauty. Luck and Misfortune comes in turn. The things you experienced, no matter good or bad, they are part of your body.The starting point came from experimenting with Waving Textile and Bias Fabric Manipulation. Initially focused on making a garment installation, I waved the colorful elastic bands on the netting fabric, and transformed the 3D waving fabric into 2D digital printing. Moving on, I used digital printing images to develop new shapes and different fabric manipulation like the layering organza, the pearling edge georgette.
DI: How can people contact you?
RZ : Email: rzhangvivia@gmail.comInstagram: https://www.instagram.com/rongzhang_fashion/Linkedin:https://www.linkedin.com/in/rong-zhang-679373115/