With a series of interviews with young designers. who showed at last year’s Fashionclash Festival, we’d like to explore what their dreams, hopes and positioning are. Today with Chinese Ting Gong.
Hello Ting, how are you today?
I am good.
How does your own description of your designs differ from others’?
My work addresses the awareness of being and a sense of absence in a world bombarded with images and sounds. It is almost humorous that my passion is to create the ‘nothing’ and yet, on a deeper layer, to push through the normality that we are missing out a lot: empty space and moments in everyday life and to share the openness.
What is the most important aspect in your design process?
I start with paying a great deal of attention to myself and the things around me. It builds my concentration on the level of artistic quality and self-expression. It works for me in this way as it brings up questions to which I find solutions. The method is about choosing small but making it big.
What are you most proud of?
I am proud of being Chinese and that I have the rooted harmony within.
We see a lot of change happening in the fashion industry at the moment – brands are going from a men’s and a women’s to a single collection and with the ‘see now, buy now’ strategy sales and distribution is affected heavily. Where do you see all this going and how do you position your brand within the changing system?
It is a proactive rather than reactive moment in which it goes to show that designers choose to work with fashion, rather than just to consume. I never see myself living according to the fashion calendar. Yet what I noticed is that I have to truly understand the word ‘self-sustainable’ and improve the brand’s footprint.
If you could give the younger you advice, what would that be?
Grow together with change makers, in collaboration with creative people from other fields. The effort we give day after day honestly reflects on our work, living and ambition.
Where do you see your brand in the future?
I will continue engaging with art and performance projects, embrace what is relevant to the core concept and integrate them into fashion operations.
You participated in last year’s Fashionclash Festival. What was this experience like for you and what benefits were you able to derive from it?
It is the microcosmos of the fashion future. I met various people and still am inspired by them. It is a step forward to build a light installation into the catwalk, with the presentation starting while the audience walked in. From this I got feedback and learnings.
What are your life goals, your biggest dreams and high hopes?
My goal is to make TING GONG part of the Zeitgeist, and personally I want to make a film like Fitzcarraldo and do outer space farming.
Thank you.
Thank you too.
