Rebekah Enns

Advisor: Lancelot Coar

The image juxtaposes physical models and text for the thesis "Beyond Dressing: Fashioning Story Embodied Architecture." A faint city map serves as the background, with wire loops at the bottom and fabric-like strips at the top. Below the wire, a block of text explains the thesis, exploring the intersection of fashion and architecture.
Wiinnipeg Montage
The black and white image shows an abstract composition with intersecting wooden planks, partially covered by woven strips of fabric and paper. The materials, in varying shades and textures, are arranged on a flat surface, a canvas.
Material Sample, Knit wire
A collage with nine photos of various buildings in the Exchange district on the left and an architectural line drawing of building facades on the right.
Exchange District Sketch
The black and white image shows a rectangular woven structure with a grid-like textile pattern. The surface alternates between tightly woven areas and open spaces, with loose threads cascading off the edges. The form resembles a simplified architectural model or abstract sculpture.
Site Model-Textile
Architectural collage with hand-drawn building designs on the left and photos of various urban buildings on the right.
The image is split into two, on the left side it shows the detailing of the textile (yarn) and on the right shows the beginning stages if the textile model. A wooden cuboid frame covered in the started knit weaving.
The image is split into two, on the left is detail pictures of the knit patterns for the textile covering the wooden cuboid frame. On the right, shows images highlighting the overall finished textile model with more details of the knit pattern

Beyond Dressing: Fashioning Story Embodied Architecture   

Fashion and architecture are shared fields of design at their cores, at their basic utility they provide our bodies with cladding against the elements, at their most inspired they provide artistic opportunity for exploring conceptual thought and abstraction of norms.  Fashion, however, differs from architecture in its unique link to the human experience due to its inherent proximity to the body.  It never strays from its relationship to the body, from providing commentary on the person within the clothes, or from the human experience of identity.  Fashion then, when understood through its relationship to the persona, becomes a powerful lens for practicing architecture. 

Fashion, in this design thesis, will be defined through a combination of elements that when added together explain how fashion is a story telling technique for the persona.  These elements are the object (physical clothing worn on the body), the styling (each item is arranged in a particular manner), and the making (fabric has been intentionally cut, sewn, pleated, gathered and tailored into form).  Architecture will be similarly defined as it is made up of the same combination, the object (building), the styling (arrangement of elements), and the making (intentional detailing of the structure and finishes). 

However, it is not enough to simply define architecture in the same manner as fashion, the practice itself needs to function under the same premise as fashion.  The structure needs to serve the persona within, bespoke in nature, it needs to provide commentary on the identity and body it has been fashioned for.  If the architectural practice is formed in service of the building’s persona, which in this thesis will be defined as its programming, it will become like fashion, intrinsically linked to the ‘body’, to the ‘identity’ within.  Although capable of artistry without this lens, buildings often become disconnected from their best intentions due to strict construction norms, cost analysis and timelines.  To maintain a close connection, no matter the budget, to the bespoke possibilities of architecture and to the creation of an architectural practice that does not stray from its relationship with the persona, fashion is a necessary influence on architectural practice.