New Purity
Matthew Ames was born in Washington, DC in 1979 and grew up in Illinois and Michigan.
He gained a BFA from The School of The Art Institute of Chicago in 2003. After working at the atelier of Jurgi Persoons in Antwerp, Belgium, Ames relocated to New York where he began working as a design assistant to Miguel Adrover. In 2004, he was selected as a finalist for the Festival de la Mode a Hyeres in France. Ames showed his first women’s wear collection in 2005 and opened a studio in Brooklyn, New York.
In 2009, Ames received the 8th annual Eco Domani Fashion Foundation Award in women’s wear design. Ames lives and works in Brooklyn, New York.
What I like in his styles is that he makes the complicated look so clean and simple. Any designer knows that the hardest part is to make a garment look unstructured and spontaneous by a long work of construction and study. Ames is really good at it.
Then I loved the journal part of his website, which is a kind of blog where he publishes his inspirations: this really helps understanding the mood of his styles, and it’s really interesting to see how he mixes classical American sportswear (like Halston) to Italian tailoring (Armani), French couture (Grès) and architectural fashions of the 80s (Anne Marie Beretta), melting all in a unique style that captures the quintessential common lines of each.
Ariko
