Informed by a background in Sculpture and a three year tutelage at Dior Homme, Jordan Askill’s eponymous jewllery label truly blurs the line between High Fashion accessory and wearable art. We recently caught up with the multi-talented London transplant to discuss mixing mediums, Summer essentials and strange requests from your siblings.
What was your first fashion memory? Princess Diana wearing royal blue with royal jewels and a gold safety pin Versace dress.
When did you know you wanted to work in fashion design? When i saw the video clip, “When Two Become One”.
You started you career out at Ksubi – what was it like working with those guys? Amazingly creative and alive in every-way. It was a supportive and encouraging environment. Like a world of young kids taking control with new and free ideas.
We recently interviewed your brother Dan, and he said that one of the weirdest things he has ever done was asking you to run through a plate of glass in your underwear after you were recovering from an illness. What was it like being on the receiving end of that request and can you remember the shoot? It seemed like a request that was meant to be, and it was with my brother and one of my best friends. It gave me something to think about and work towards while I was getting better. I was running in the heat in my white shorts jumping through sheets of candy glass – it felt like something I had to go through in order to recover.
Still from “We Have Decided Not To Die” (2003) by Daniel Askill
What prompted you to start your eponymous jewelry label? I love being able to create something that I feel I can be in control of and do something I feel is important. I think photography and illustration is so important to capture memories. Using modern techniques for sculpture and looking at traditional ways of creating articulated jewellery is my way of bringing to life a memory or a vision.
There’s a definite fragility and innocence present in your work, do you think this reflects your sensibilities as a person? I believe that I create work that is honest to who I am and how I feel. As a result, I think it probably does say a lot about me – as a person, but more so about ideas that I have or feelings I experience. I think fragility and innocence are traits that are present in everyone to some extent, at some point in our lives.
What labels do you love and which ones should we look out for? I feel strongly about young designers, I think their work is relevant and paints a picture of this moment in time. Meadham Kirchhoff, Michelle Jank, Josh Goot, Louise Gray, Christopher Kane, and Richard Nicoll are just some. I also admire those tailors, ateliers in luxury houses, crafts-people, goldsmiths and silversmiths from times past. To me, they are as important as those who exist now.
Meadham Kirchoff SS/10 Accessory Collaboration
Do you have any plans to expand into clothing? I do like this idea, the idea of trying to create special pieces seems nice. Perhaps it is something that will evolve in the future, exactly how or in which direction I don’t know just yet!
Where do you find inspiration? I find that more and more, feelings come from things that I see and watch, just in daily life. All this mixed with past memories. Water and any natural creations are always very relevant to me.
What is your design process from conception to production… I have a motif or image. I then sketch it or try to put it together in handmade 3D. I then like to image in Cad / 3D programs. I then make a computer generated piece of this. I have just made one of these nylon sculptures into copper and enamelled it white . It is now timeless. Then I make jewellery pieces that fit into and around this object in adornment.
Battle Cat Sculpture, London Fashion Week, 2009
What are your Summer wardrobe essentials? Shorts, T-shirts, shirts with a collar and a hat. Anything that will block out the sun, or will make me look like I stepped out of “Room with a View”.
How do you balance the fashion design with your other creative endeavors -do you find it refreshing to move between mediums? I still style different things: design costumes, shoots, and work on different film projects which I love. I enjoy being involved in more commercial projects as well as my own pursuits and find that as long as there is enough time, I am able to learn things that are completely relevant to what i do day-to-day.
How is the new jewelry collection shaping up? What are your reference points/inspiration? Yeah good. I am currently producing some exclusive JORDY Heart pieces for Land’s End Store and Liberty in London. I’ve created the first part of the new sculpture that’s a helmet shape made of birds that fits me. I am using a motif that I’ve used in the past. This time exploring more animation and the idea of freezing moments in time. I am introducing new characters to protect current ones.
