Beginning tomorrow, RMIT Melbourne’s new Design Hub will play host to Dream The World Awake, a major career retrospective of the work of iconic Antwerp Six designer Walter Van Beirendonck, celebrating his nonpareil, awe-inspiring imagination and innovative contributions to menswear.
Curated by the Antwerp Fashion Museum and shown for the first time outside of Van Beirendonck’s native Belgium, Dream The World Awake spans three decades of the fashion iconoclast’s career, from his early days as a member of the pioneering Belgian avant-garde collective in the 80s to the faithfully-reconstructed collections he shows today in Paris alongside the museum-worthy work of his contemporaries Dries van Noten and Ann Demeulemeester, along with his partner, Dirk Van Saene.
The retrospective opens to the public tomorrow (17/07) and runs until October 5th, will cost you nothing and looks like it’ll be everything. Van Beirendonck is also the Head of Fashion at Antwerp’s Royal Academy of Fine Art – regarded as one of the top five fashion schools – so students of both design and life should form an orderly queue for an insight into Van Beirendonck’s unique vision of the world.
You can find more information here and below is an exclusive preview of what you can expect, accompanied by an interview with Walter:
Photo: Francois Guillot via Getty
