Rosie Zirou Zhang, a fashion and textile designer, intricately weaves narratives through her fabric creations. With a passion for hands-on techniques such as sewing, knitting, weaving, and dyeing, Rosie infuses her fabrics with vibrant colors and diverse textures, creating garments that exude playful and sentimental moods when draped on the body.
At the heart of Rosie’s creative journey lies a profound love for textiles, drawing inspiration from the natural beauty of butterflies. Her Butterfly Collection serves as a testament to this inspiration, where she intricately mimics microscopic wing scales and crafts woven interpretations of delicate wings. Notable examples include the Folded Butterfly, where she employs warp painting to adorn two warps with distinct colors, creating ‘windows’ that reveal painted wings. Each piece tells a unique story, reflecting Rosie’s skill and imagination.
Rosie’s work is also a journey of personal expression. Through her creative exploration, she discovered her true joy lies in the tactile act of crafting fabric by hand, blurring the boundaries between fashion and fiber. Textile creation becomes a powerful means for Rosie to express personality, mood, and energy. She revels in experimenting with color combinations, witnessing new and unique fabrics emerge from her creative process, and seeing her vision come to life as she drapes meticulously crafted fabric onto a form.
Furthermore, Rosie is dedicated to addressing the significant waste prevalent in the fashion industry through her designs. She aims to showcase that fashion designers can actively reduce waste by repurposing old fabrics and creating new ones. For instance, she dyed muslin for unique prints and utilized leftover yarn and scrap fabric to create innovative textiles, as exemplified in the Butterfly Collection. Rosie finds immense fulfillment in crafting these sustainable fabrics. Through promoting sustainable practices and innovation, she believes we can propel the fashion industry towards greater environmental consciousness.
In Rosie Zhang’s textiles, beauty, resilience, and boundless creativity intertwine to narrate stories that captivate the senses and inspire imagination—a testament to the transformative power of fabric and the enduring spirit of artistic expression.
