The phrase “I’m wearing my favorite designer” may take on a whole new meaning, thanks to Tina Gorjanc, founder of the label Pure Human. Gorjanc got ahold of a sample of Alexander McQueen‘s DNA and, naturally, plans to use it to make leather backpacks, jackets and purses. Delightful.
It is worth noting that McQueen’s posthumous line started out as a student project at his own alma mater, Central Saint Martins, and remains in the proposal stage. However, according to Oyster magazine, Gorjanc has already successfully grown a small sample of her fabric of choice (the designer’s skin tissue).
Of the project, which aims to highlight the “shortcomings concerning the protection of biological information,” Gorjanc says, “If a student like me was able to patent a material extracted from Alexander McQueen’s biological information as there was no legislation to stop me, we can only imagine what big corporations with bigger funding are going to be capable of doing in the future.” Gorjanc’s work underlines the problematic fact that appropriating someone else’s DNA is still considered fair use. And yet, for the moment, this is the most macabre fate we can imagine for our remains.
Image: Mike Marsland/WireImage
We’re not sure how McQueen, who passed away in 2010 at the age of 40 (may he rest in peace), would feel about being turned into a human Birkin. True, he did have a taste for the uncomfortable and slightly grotesque. McQueen’s debut collection, entitled Jack the Ripper Stalks His Victims, contained an homage to the legendary serial killer. Mimicking the female brutalizer’s calling card, the designer placed a single lock of his own hair into the clear plastic label of each piece. Ironically, those same hair samples are the source from which Gorjanc grew McQueen’s DNA.
That said, he would certainly get behind the political statement. McQueen’s Highland Rape collection was one of the most controversial the fashion world’s ever seen, meant to draw attention to England’s “ethnic cleansing” of Scotland in the 18th and 19th centuries.
Here’s another fun fact: A mock label for the accessories collection, which deems itself the “intersection of luxury and biology” advises wearers to slather their “100% human leather” with moisturizer and SPF. Vom.
[ via Dezeen ]
