






Es gibt Automagazine und es gibt Automagazine. Das britische Intersection Magazine ist eines an dem man sich auch erfreuen kann selbst wenn das Herz für Lifestyle, Design und Mode und nicht für Autos schlägt.
Intersection hat sich auf die Fahne geschrieben, Gegensätze wie „Mann und Maschine, Kunst und Design, Mode und Architektur, Musik und Film auf dem Rücksitz eines parkenden Autos zu vereinen.” Mit dem aktuellen Titelthema „dress your car in couture” hat das Magazin mal wieder die Nase vorne und wird seinem hohen Selbstanspruch gerecht: keine Geringeren als Bless, Maison Martin Margiela, Ksubi, Visvim, Adam Kimmel und Richard James wurden ins Boot geholt um den Alfa Brera „einzukleiden”. Obwohl aus der Mode kommend, sind alle der sechs Designer und Designteams bekannt für ihre kosmopolitischen, interdisziplinären Arbeiten. Gut so, denn Zielsetzung war, neue, innovative Aspekte von Mode und Modedesign zu präsentieren, Neues und Unerwartetes zu gestalten und Mode mit anderen Designdisziplinen zusammenzubringen. Und so ging der italienische Alfa Brera auf eine große Reise. Von New York nach London, Tokyo nach Sydney, von Paris nach Berlin und schließlich zurück nach Mailand wo er auf der Möbelmesse präsentiert wurde.
Schade dass solche interdisziplinären Projekte so selten sind.



Adam Kimmel
” I collected jumpsuits from various Italian mechanics for the car cover. In Italy, they wear them with colors and patches, unlike the bland grays and navy colored ones you see often in New York City. I wanted to use these suits to create something of a quilt to cover the car. I even left the arms attached to make the result more of an object. I figured, if we blew air underneath, the arms would flail and give some life. When all was done, the colors clashed so poorly that I threw the whole thing into a vat of black dye which brought back that New York feeling in the end. I can´t leave my roots even if I try”.


Ksubi
“When we approach design our reaction is to insubordinate or subvert a product´s normal function. We found the idea of a mammoth black box that hovered two inches off the road whilst humming and blinking a tiny red light at you, exciting. We are amused by the absurd minimalism of the idea, and also by how obnoxious and powerful the simple form could be. I might add that it would also be a great as deterrent for would be thieves.”



Bless
“We like the idea that one could bring his/her favorite car upstairs and use it indoors for a different function and sit and sleep on it. It was meant to be in leather, but since it´s somehow a couture dress and needed a very complex pattern to fit, it took us so long to try this first. But you sould imagine it in a beige natural leather that ages and tans with time.”



Richard James
“It´s almost like a caricature of a suit. We decided the coat should represent a bespoke suit in the making – something that´s never seen by anyone other than the customer and the tailor. To begin with we made a calico toile, then pinned, shaped and sculpted it on the car to fit perfectly. Then we picked out some key design elements from the car – the wing mirrors, the classic Alfa grille and window shapes – and highlighted them with panels of canvassing and lining.”



Visvim
“We came up with a pattern for the cover based on the car´s specifications. We picked the materials: we wanted to use traditional American-style hand-quilting patterns, so we found materials that would work and welded them to Gore-Tex. Once that process was complete, we stitched our quilt pieces together and sealed off all the seams underneath with custom Visvim/Gore seam tape.
Many years ago we used “Folk + Engineering” as the theme for one of our collections, and that seems applicable to this project as well.”

Maison Martin Margiela
“The making off the car cover follows the same concept as our clothes design with a made-to-measure process.
First we wanted a fabric that was as close as possible to the cotton we always use for furniture covering and press material, that is a rough white boiled cotton, but taking into account the technical constraints of the purpose of the cover (water and wind proof, resistance, etc.). Then we printed a picture in real size of the car in a very contrasted black and white to create a “trompe l`oeil” effect. The challenge was to cut up the picture according to the parts of the car cover so when put together the parts reproduce the picture in 3D.”