Rodarte

By Lisa Peck, ASID
Rodarte, the design team of Kate and Laura Mulleavy, are phenoms who inspire me and I love what they have to say about their creative process and where they draw their inspiration. Fashionistas will be familiar with Rodarte and designers and architects will soon become familiar with the launch of their fabric designs for Knoll Luxe in May.
“We just balance each other out all the time. Kate majored in art history and I majored in English. But for us this is what we were meant to do.” Said Laura in an interview with Vanity Fair.
Not trained in fashion design the sisters have been featured at the Cooper-Hewitt Museum in a retrospective of their brief careers. The Quick Take exhibits are meant to allow modern, relevant work to be brought to the museum in an expedient way.
“We start with something familiar that we see or remember and start building associations from that. That are usually visual” (quote from Cooper-Hewitt video)
They have based recent collections on the California condor, dilapidated houses, horror films, Star Wars, road trips, Frankenstein. They speak frequently of manipulating materials pulling apart wool, burning the edges of fabric and cutting fabric into strips.
“I think we really respond to things that are textural. I like the combination of things that look ruined and perfect at the same time”
They speak of their love of the landscapes of the American West, a passion for road trips, and film. Their collection of fabrics for Knoll Luxe is named for poets.
What strikes me is that they are drawing their inspirations from the natural world, from film, from material, from poets, and from exploration of their own ideas. Their well-rounded approach
results in great design.

Sneak peak of Rodarte collection for Knoll Luxe.
Rodarte design for mini-collection for athletes of the winter olympics

Rodarte designed fashion.