Nick Knight, Susannah Frankel, Nick Ryan and Daniel Brown

The Sound Of Clothes: Synaesthesia

Using the notion of 'pictures for the blind' as a stimulus, Nick Knight and digital artist Daniel Brown collaborated with synaesthete and sound designer Nick Ryan to interpret garments from Nicolas Ghesquiere's Spring/Summer 2006 Balenciaga collection through sound. The garments are described through both Knight's visuals, and of sound interactives

Interactive

Interactive by Daniel Brown, sound by Nick Ryan.

The interactive is best viewed in Firefox. You may need to update your Shockwave plugin, but there is a link beneath the interactive to help you do this.

This project uses the Shockwave plugin to display content. This is available to download for free from the Adobe website.

About

synaesthesia or U.S. synesthesia (,sɪniːsˈθiːzɪə), noun
1 Physiol. a sensation experienced in a part of the body other than the part stimulated.
2 Psychol. the subjective sensation of a sense other than the one being stimulated. For example, a sound may evoke a sensation of colour.
From New Latin, from SYN- + -esthesia, from Greek aisthēsis, sensation

During the shoot of a 'Balenciaga special' by Nick Knight for Pop magazine in November 2005, digital artist Daniel Brown was invited on set to respond to Nicolas Ghesquiere's Spring/Summer 2006 collection. Inspired by the delicately layered, translucent garments, Brown proposed a series of interactives based on unpublished images from Knight's story. Using the notion of 'pictures for the blind' as a stimulus, a collaboration with synaesthete and sound designer Nick Ryan ensued, aiming to interpret the source garments and images through sound.

Here, Nick Knight's final Pop editorial and unpublished images are showcased alongside Brown's interactive, an essay examining the Spring/Summer 2006 Balenciaga collection by Susannah Frankel and films documenting the entire process of this shoot.

Over spring 2006, SHOWstudio embarked on a series of of projects devoted to exploring 'The Sound of Clothes'. Continuing our commitment to re-thinking mainstream fashion editorial, we believe fashion audio to be a genuinely new frontier, ripe for exploration through interactives and fashion films.

Credits / Contributors

Concept and Direction: Daniel Brown, Nick Knight and Nick Ryan
Interactive Development: Daniel Brown
Audio Development: Nick Ryan
Technical Development: Dorian Moore
Photography: Nick Knight
Model: Gemma Ward
Styling: Jonathan Kaye
Essay: Susannah Frankel
Mannequin Images: Nick Knight
Thanks to POP magazine

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