Iris van Herpen: Sculpting the Senses

In its liquid, frozen or gaseous states, water often features in Iris van Herpen’s work, even forming the principal focus of her 2010 Crystallisation collection. A major component of the human body, the notion of water emerges from her dresses to transcend the invisible flux that constitutes our very essence. On every level—from drops of rain to a tsunami, as a poetic allegory or gateway to the shadow world, representing both harmony and chaos, in the form of foam, crystallised liquid or waves, water inspires the designer’s extraordinary creativity. Bubbles suspended in space, transparent fields of mist, turquoise or deep blue waves, Iris van Herpen’s aquatic pieces reveal the mystery and metaphorical power of water, manifested across a multitude of fabrics, materials and techniques from blown glass to thermoformed plexiglass, from laser cutting to suminagashi—a Japanese technique of marbled ink drawings.

Under the surface of the oceans is a world invisible to the naked eye, that is nonetheless fundamental to life on Earth. Iris van Herpen’s 2020 collection, Sensory Seas, draws inspiration from this ecosystem, its abundant and diverse plankton species and, on a broader scale, from sea animals, that shape the designs and textures of her dresses. Single-cell organisms and the Hydrozoa family such as jellyfish are the designer’s most constant form of inspiration. They are her fundamental reference point as she seeks to bring them to light in her works. Just as the 19th-century master glassmakers Leopold and Rudolf Blaschka revealed this elusive world with their astonishing pedagogical models, Iris van Herpen takes up the same subjects and transposes them, with craftsmanship and new technologies, into the field of haute couture.

Arranged as a contemporary cabinet of curiosities, this space reflects Iris van Herpen’s multiple sources of inspiration. This eclectic selection reveals her love of discovery, her interest in disciplines both adjacent to and distant from fashion, and her fascination with the richness and diversity of our world. Works of art, books, insects and other specimens evoke the spheres from which she regularly draws inspiration, to enlighten and renew her practice. Straddling centuries, the arts and sciences, her dresses are set in dialogue with footwear and accessories created in collaboration with numerous artists. An encyclopaedic representation of van Herpen’s career, this cabinet is a synthesis of her endless creativity, holistic approach and talent for drawing out the connections between worlds.

Iris van Herpen’s fascination with shapes found in nature has led her to reflect on morphogenesis, the biological process by which organisms develop their shape and form, and the creative forces at the origins of life. That which is microscopically small is reflective of the beauty of the invisible worlds and has directed van Herpen towards a new aesthetic language and materials that transcend the field of fashion. With this perspective, she maintains a particular interest in the work of 19th century biologist Ernst Haeckel, whose illustrations shed light on many microscopic beings.

Mixing art and science, van Herpen explores both terrestrial and marine worlds to unearth new structures and textures. Her preoccupation with sustainability and the environment has led her to re-examine how we view the world, notably in her Earthrise collection, created with the artist Rogan Brown, in which she chose to elevate recycled plastic as material.

Cabinets of curiosities and anatomical museums are fertile grounds of inspiration for Iris van Herpen. Like the artists Michelangelo, Jean-Antoine Houdon, and many others who studied anatomical representations of the human being, van Herpen analyses the skeleton, muscles, connective tissues and systems of the body to create forms that can be worn like a second skin. Her dresses are hybrid structures, projections of our inner constitutions, that create the fiction of a new body.

Van Herpen breathes new life into the idea of the silhouette by exploring the frontier between the living and inert. Her clothing is an extension of the body and, at the same time, a mutation of complex anatomical forms. She sheds light on that which is barely perceptible through the transparency of skin, that which is only able to be revealed with technology. Her designs could be likened to an artistic Magnetic Resonance Imaging (MRI) scan, a creative X-ray of the structure of living organisms.

The materiality, autonomy and sensory systems of the body clearly resonate throughout Iris van Herpen’s creations. However, other dimensions of the human experience also fascinate and inspire her. Van Herpen has taken a keen interest in the brain, particularly in the notion of synaesthesia and complex phenomena or modified states of consciousness, such as lucid dreaming and hypnosis. These interests permit her to stretch the boundaries of fashion beyond a visual or tangible experience of a piece of clothing. Fascinated by neurological research, she seeks to test perception and amplify the senses, to sculpt them along with the materials she chooses. How does one dilute the boundaries of perception? How can one stimulate the brain, with all five senses working together, to evoke a new experience?

Iris van Herpen creates her collections in a former warehouse in Amsterdam, where large windows open out onto the reflective surface and serenity of the neighbouring river. Surrounded by a young and international team, van Herpen experiments with materials whenever she engages with a new collection. This approach, which she describes as a “craftolution,” is based on a combination of craftsmanship and new technologies which weave haute couture with the future. She paves the way for more sustainable and responsible alternatives through her multidisciplinary approach, by revisiting manufacturing methods which led her to collaborate with a multitude of experts from architect and artist Philip Beesley and the Living Architecture Systems Group, designers Neri Oxman and Studio Drift, to artists Rogan Brown and Kim Keever. Each of her designs is distinctive and recognisable through a fine balance of inventiveness with experimental techniques such as silicone moulding, 3D printing and waterjet-cutting to ancient plissé (a pleating technique that has been used since the pharaohs of Egypt) and even magnetised sculpting.

Iris van Herpen is fascinated by structures, whether natural or artificial, organic or architectural. In her practice, she takes a holistic approach in blending together these areas of investigation. For van Herpen, the human body is both unique and part of a universal whole, connected to, and by, its physicality, but also its spirit, soul, memory and essence. From the singularities of the living world, van Herpen references different ecosystems, processes of growth and interconnections. For example, mushrooms, one of the first complex life forms on our planet, weave underground connections with filaments of mycelium. This mycelial network seduced van Herpen both with its beauty and the intelligence of its generative system. An ode to nature, the Roots of Rebirth collection is an homage to this infinitely thin subterranean organic web. In contrast to the organic is the architectural, and van Herpen celebrates the flamboyant Gothic architectural style, with her Cathedral dress that reinvents the codes of clothing.

Iris van Herpen is fascinated by structures, whether natural or artificial, organic or architectural. In her practice, she takes a holistic approach in blending together these areas of investigation. For van Herpen, the human body is both unique and part of a universal whole, connected to, and by, its physicality, but also its spirit, soul, memory and essence. From the singularities of the living world, van Herpen references different ecosystems, processes of growth and interconnections. For example, mushrooms, one of the first complex life forms on our planet, weave underground connections with filaments of mycelium. This mycelial network seduced van Herpen both with its beauty and the intelligence of its generative system. An ode to nature, the Roots of Rebirth collection is an homage to this infinitely thin subterranean organic web. In contrast to the organic is the architectural, and van Herpen celebrates the flamboyant Gothic architectural style, with her Cathedral dress that reinvents the codes of clothing.

Iris van Herpen was born in the village of Wamel in the Netherlands, situated near Den Bosch, which was the hometown of 16th century Flemish painter Hieronymus Bosch. Van Herpen grew up examining Bosch’s fantastical worlds that mix alchemy, mysticism and allegory. From her study of Bosch, she retains a fascination with ideas of hybridisation, an incessant questioning of human and animal nature and an interest in fusing both.

In parallel, van Herpen explores the emotion of fear Bosch’s imaginary worlds invoke. This is done through her discoveries made in the collection of the Embassy of the Free Mind—an organisation in Amsterdam dedicated to freedom of thought. Van Herpen also revisited the various cabinets of curiosities she encountered in her studies of Art History. 

Symbolist and Surrealist literature has also led her to use metaphors as a mode of expression, elevating her work beyond conventional dressing classifications. From Ovid’s Metamorphoses poem to Japanese mythology, van Herpen loves reinterpreting the mutations and uncanny qualities of our world and others.

In many of her collections, Iris van Herpen’s life-like silhouettes celebrate a new and futuristic concept of nature and humanity. In her perception of an imaginary future, she is, above all, interested in the distinction between nature and artifice in a society absorbed with the growing presence of Virtual Reality. Through her designs, van Herpen questions the presence of the body in a post-human world, and invites us to contemplate a society that is increasingly living “inside-out”. In her Syntopia, Escapism and Voltage collections, she interrogates the link between technology and science. Fascinated by the world of tomorrow, van Herpen melds disciplines, weaving them together, giving rise to a new definition of fashion in which the garment itself triggers a metamorphosis, transforming the body into a hybrid creature—the embodiment of a futuristic vision.

In her exploration of the cosmos, Iris van Herpen displays her talent for synthesis, combining the latest scientific discoveries with the history of art and science, blending the ancient maps of 17th century cartographer Andreas Cellarius with images from the James Webb telescope. The cosmos and its mysteries pique van Herpen’s imagination and trigger her creativity.

Used as a metaphor for van Herpen’s holistic and multidisciplinary approach, the cosmos represents a space in which one can explore and create without limitations, it is a symbol of absolute freedom. Colours float and come alive, offering new horizons for a body that can exist in different dimensions and planes. For the designer, to understand the cosmos is to overturn the order of time and space and achieve elevation. The world becomes an all-encompassing entity, greater than the confines of planet Earth. It no longer develops from bottom up or top down, but in all of its dimensions simultaneously, as a multiverse, with no borders except those of the mind and the imagination, the soul and its cosmic journey.