SAIC Fashion Resource Center

11/22/2022

FREE SCREENING + TALK
LOUISE DAHL-WOLFE: PAINTING WITH LIGHT
A SHORT DOCUMENTARY FILM BY TOM NEFF

Join us for a unique free event open to the public and SAIC’s community. Ten years before its 1999 release, filmmaker Tom Neff set out to explore Louise Dahl-Wolfe’s legacy; an overlooked figure who revolutionized the rules of fashion photography. Today his film offers the only surviving footage of Dahl-Wolfe, whom he interviewed before her death in 1989. Twenty-three years have passed since the short documentary aired on PBS. Its screening at the Gene Siskel Film Center is an opportunity to reconsider and center Dahl-Wolfe’s contributions to fashion photography. The 25-minute screening will be followed by a 30-minute visually immersive talk with the film’s director Tom Neff and editor Barry Rubinow. A joint program of SAIC Fashion Resource Center, Fashion Department & Fashion Council.

WHEN: Tuesday, Nov. 29,2022, 6:00pm-7:00pm
WHERE: Gene Siskel Film Center, 164 N. State St.
FREE TICKETS AVAILABLE AT GENE SISKEL BOX OFFICE ON DAY OF EVENT

LINK to the event on the Gene Siskel’s website.

09/06/2022

Don’t miss SAIC’s FRC Sale! Our largest sale to date is open to SAIC and AIC community. Snap up designer and vintage fashions and accessories, rolls of fabric, boxes of buttons, sewing supplies, your next Halloween look and much more to get you through the semester!

WHEN: Monday, September 12, 9am-5pm
WHERE: Ground floor of SAIC’s Leroy Neiman Center (37 South Wabash Avenue)

Be kind to the planet - bring your own bags or a suitcase!
No cash - ArtiCard and Credit Cards only accepted.
All proceeds from sale go towards maintaining the Fashion Resource Center and its collection.

10/11/2018

Current exhibition at the Fashion Resource Center! Come take a look for more details!

04/04/2018

"On a base, commercial level, the old rules of seasons and of male and female suddenly seem inapplicable, irrelevant — fashion labels are challenging gender binaries, eschewing retrospective styles, cultural cherry-picking and lazy luxury for something more fluid and less easily categorized."

Fashion has always reflected — and deflected — global unrest. This season, the responses are as hysterical as the culture itself.

03/22/2018

Calling all SAIC Fashion Resource Center fans:
Are you following our Instagram? Be sure to check out this page as we highlight objects from our vast collection of innovative fashion design and publishing!

https://www.instagram.com/fashionresourcecenter/

03/19/2018

"So, how deliciously apt that the selfie-loving, Instagram-curating masses chose Gucci’s severed head as the most ‘gramable accessory of the season, in a literal reflection of ourselves. We carry around our phones which help us construct our digital identities as we pick and choose bits of our lives, bits of culture and snippets of time to share with others. As Michele stated after his show, 'we are all Doctor Frankenstein of our lives.'"

This year, the biggest shows really were the BIGGEST. So what’s really behind Vetements, Gucci and Balenciaga’s more-is-more aesthetic?

03/01/2018

“'The day of the romantic designer, standing safely in a zone outside of business and production is over,' she wrote in her show notes, by way of explaining her commitment to 'upcycling' and working more sustainably — as in the pièce de résistance, show-closing dresses made of vintage scarves or shirts found, washed and then combined"

In her first formal show, the 2017 LVMH Prize winner broadened her styles to embrace a bit of tough glamour and “upcycled” vintage textiles.

01/26/2018

In celebration of the 20-year anniversary of the avant-garde store and 30 years of the SAIC Fashion Resource Center, we invite you to attend our inaugural spring presentation, a conversation with SAIC Alumni Robin Richman and Kortney Dziedzic. Join us for this journey behind the scenes of the world of fashion through the eyes of the innovative knitwear designer, retailer, stylist, and fashion consultant. This lunchtime event is hosted by the FRC Collective (), a student-run group who leads a variety of ongoing projects in order to better serve and expand the impact of the Fashion Resource Center.
Wednesday, January 31, 2018
12—1 PM
Sullivan Gallery Conference Room, SAIC

01/14/2018

“I wanted to make punk elegant,” says the designer. “It was natural for me to interpret music or movies that I grew up with — that shaped me. I was always interested in rebellion. So, I decided to make clothes that are not merely beautiful; I wanted to interpret culture into fashion.”

In a rare interview, the reclusive Japanese auteur-designer Jun Takahashi reveals the driving philosophy behind Undercover.

12/29/2017

SAIC alumni, faculty, and the School's Fashion Resource Center (FRC) were featured prominently in the Chicago Reader article, "Protest Fashion Is All the Rage," extolling the many

12/14/2017

Thank you Aimee Levitt from the Chicago Reader for featuring the SAIC Fashion Resource Center in this recent article on radical dress. Levitt visited the center as the starting point of her research on clothing democracy and protest fashion:

"[The Fashion Resource Center] is a wondrous place, with one room filled with books and a century's worth of fashion magazines and a second room, equally large, packed with vintage clothes, organized by designer. It feels like the world's most fabulous closet"

Is the revolution in clothing design a sign of a bigger revolt to come?