Fashion Documentaries for Today’s Teen

February 27, 2023 3:49 PM

My son, age 15, is very interested in fashion, with special fascination with the design process. Please recommend documentaries and books that dig into this.

His knowledge to date is whatever he is finding on TikTok, IG, etc, with an odd copy of GQ drifting by on occasion.

What documentaries show the design process from idea to sketch to fabrication?

Also, biographies of classic or contemporary designers might offer a good narrative hook.

And maybe things like Bill Cunningham: New York might be good. Or something that shows what design education is like, e.g. FIT.

As for books, he loves to sketch, so anything that shows how designers draw.

I know, I’m all over that place. And I don’t want to inundate him with a syllabus. Just a nice archive of things he might enjoy and learn from.

Open this way of seeing, this skill set, this world for him.

posted by Caxton1476 to Media & Arts (20 answers total)

Project Runway might be of interest? It's not as deep as documentaries, but it's a lot of fun and you get to see different peoples' process and ideas and along the way I do think you get some sense of how designs are built and how new ideas work or don't work.

I own (but have already watched) the DVDs for the 2007 season with Christian Siriano. I bought the set because I had been enjoying later seasons but not all of the earliest ones are available streaming. If you have a way to watch DVDs and are interested, I'd be completely willing to drop them in the mail for you, just memail me.
posted by vunder at 3:56 PM on February 27, 2023 [9 favorites]

It may seem silly, but Project Runway was the first reality tv series that I actually liked, because it had actually-talented people engaging in creative battle. They definitely engineered some drama with casting choices along the way (ugh, WENDY), the whole thing was predicated on product placements, and the judges’ tastes are often quite conventional, but it’s worth a watch! I also remember Tim Gunn modeling good mentorship, getting people to think about their choices without telling them what to do. More recently, Netflix did Next in Fashion, Amazon Prime did Making The Cut, the UK did The Great British Sewing Bee… might any of those be of interest?
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 3:56 PM on February 27, 2023 [3 favorites]

Hehehe. Great minds, vunder!
posted by rrrrrrrrrt at 3:56 PM on February 27, 2023 [1 favorite]

It's been a while since I've seen it, but Dior and I, from what I remember, is about the whole process of creating a collection -- from conception to completion (including a lot of the labor actually sewing the clothes).

I am going to try to think of other ones.
posted by edencosmic at 3:57 PM on February 27, 2023 [1 favorite]

I don't know how perfect it is, but the 1995 documentary Unzipped follows Isaac Mizrahi "as he plans and ultimately shows his fall 1994 collection". Looks like the whole thing is up on Vimeo.
posted by ivan ivanych samovar at 3:58 PM on February 27, 2023 [5 favorites]

(Frédéric Tcheng also directed Halston, which is good, but my memories of it are less about the process and more about the whole thing. Still worth watching, but less of what you're looking for.)
posted by edencosmic at 4:00 PM on February 27, 2023

Less on design per se than on the history of materials: Kassia St Clair's The Golden Thread is a cultural history of fabrics and the human use of fabrics, and it's extraordinary.
posted by Fiasco da Gama at 4:03 PM on February 27, 2023 [2 favorites]

Wim Wender's 1989 portrait of Yohji Yamamoto, 'Notebook on Cities and Clothes' is a great one, not sure how easy it is to see presently though!

Ian Bohote's 2018 doc about Alexander McQueen also highly recommended, for the incredible runway/show footage in particular. It's a tragic story though.
posted by remembrancer at 4:13 PM on February 27, 2023 [4 favorites]

NHK World has a bunch of segments on both traditional and contemporary fashion design and related topics, like textiles, in Japan. Some are dubbed, some are subtitled, some are so earnest they're goofy (and a few are just state media goofy), but there are some great ones.
posted by wintersweet at 4:20 PM on February 27, 2023

If he’s interested in designers drawing, I’d look for Loïc Prigent‘s documentaries: The Drawings of Yves Saint Laurent, The Drawings of Christian Dior and Karl Lagerfeld Sketches His Life.

His 5 part series Signe Chanel is a very good look at the development of a haute couture collection, lots of time is spent with the premiers and petites mains in the atelier.
posted by VirginiaPlain at 4:35 PM on February 27, 2023

Alan Flusser's Dressing the Man, and his Style and the Man are both visually rich books he might enjoy.
posted by SyraCarol at 5:06 PM on February 27, 2023

Also, the podcast American Ivy is so so interesting and well done about menswear.
posted by vunder at 5:34 PM on February 27, 2023 [1 favorite]

McQueen is a great biopic, and Avery Trufleman did a few other seasons of Articles of Interest before landing on the American Ivy theme.
posted by PaulaSchultz at 7:37 PM on February 27, 2023 [1 favorite]

Not a book or a movie, but I learned a LOT from fashion-incubator.com, written by a pattern designer in the fashion industry. Lots of very technical but interesting behind-the-scenes stuff.
posted by music for skeletons at 10:18 PM on February 27, 2023

Valentino: The Last Emperor is good for this, and a great film on its own.
posted by parmanparman at 12:10 AM on February 28, 2023 [1 favorite]

I can recommend the documentary film Yves Saint Laurent, 5 avenue Marceau, 75116 Paris, about the designer bringing his ideas into being. Very focused on what goes on in the atelier. Here's an excerpt from a review on the IMDB page of a companion film:
"Yves Saint Laurent 5 avenue Marceau 75116 Paris is coverage of YSL and his staff preparing over a period of several months what turned out to be his last annual collection, dress by dress, in a film which has not inaccurately been called 'incredibly tedious. But if you're into French couturier design or are yourself a designer, this is gold."

Seconding Signé Chanel:
"A mini series showing the creation of a Haute Couture collection at iconic fashion house Chanel."
posted by Avalow at 3:00 AM on February 28, 2023 [2 favorites]

Best answer: Zoe Hong has amazing youtube content for getting into the fashion industry. So detailed and really everything from thinking about careers to how to build a collection and a portfolio and drawing and construction and runway reviews.

When I was strongly considering a career in fashion, I also really loved that Vogue posts complete runways on their website. This is a great way to start looking at trends and to see what's happening currently without spending any $
posted by Sweetchrysanthemum at 7:38 AM on February 28, 2023 [1 favorite]

If YouTube works within your parameters, I'd suggest checking out some videos on The Closet Historian's channel! She focuses on vintage/historical womenswear designs, but gives very clear explanations on how she goes from inspiration to concept to design to finished product, with lots of detailed sewing progress shown so you can see how things come together and how minor adjustments can change the look of a garment. She also creates cohesive, themed lookbooks, and shows the staggering amount of work that goes into creating them. This recent video/playlist on finding inspiration from other designers' runway shows might be of particular interest!
posted by quatsch at 9:25 AM on February 28, 2023 [1 favorite]

Just an fyi, many of the seasons of Project Runway + PR All Stars are free on Tubi.
posted by TWinbrook8 at 9:29 AM on February 28, 2023 [2 favorites]

The September Issue is also worth a watch. Fashion design-adjacent, it's about the prep that goes into Vogue magazine's September issue, which is (apparently) the most important issue of that magazine each year. I enjoyed it enormously.
posted by essexjan at 9:39 AM on February 28, 2023 [2 favorites]