Mad About The Boy

Launched on 11 May 2016

Mad About The Boy, on display at the Fashion Space Gallery from 8 January to 2 April 2016, explored fashion’s obsession with youth, focusing on the way ideas of the teenage boy are constructed through specific collections and fashion images. It was the first exhibition curated by SHOWstudio editor Lou Stoppard. Sparked by the success of designers like Hedi Slimane at Saint Laurent, Raf Simons and Gosha Rubchinskiy – all of whom seem to share a fixation with youth culture – the exhibition set out to examine the tropes and parallels within fashion’s treatment of youth, unpicking the many notions of the young male that feature in fashion’s imagination, from outsider to sexual fantasy to reveller. It presented the work of a variety of designers and image-makers, current as well as select examples from the seventies, eighties and nineties, for whom the boy provides a constant source of inspiration. Testimony about masculinity and youth was also included to shed light on the sense of fluidity and possibility that many associate with teenage years – a time of perceived infinite opportunity, spontaneity and creative freedom.

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Project

Tumblr Takeover: Mad About the Boy

01 January 2016
For one week on our Tumblr, Lou Stoppard shares the references and research behind her upcoming exhibition, Mad About The Boy.
Project

Fashioning Masculinities

08 April 2022
The performance of menswear through clothing is examined in a series of videos exploring the Victoria & Albert museum's blockbuster exhibition.
Project

North

03 November 2015
A project exploring Northern identity, depictions of the North of England in fashion imagery and the importance of place in creativity.
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