Colin Henderson is an inspiring and original contribution to the world of fashion and art. Incapable of being pigeonholed, he is a celebrated “all-rounder”, experimenting with different medias and outcomes.
Conquering video directing, art direction, fashion, illustration and painting, Colin Henderson takes Fantasy, Sixties Psychedelia and 1980s 8bit pixelation, and transforms these nostalgic influences into contemporary and forward thinking illustrations and designs.
I first saw his work in Dazed and Confused magazine, when he created the above denim jacket for the magazine article. I was immediately fascinated by his illustrations and have followed his work ever since, as I also feel I can relate to his genre.
Henderson originally studied Illustration at Bournemouth Arts Institute. There, he developed his own individual style. This developed into adapting these illustrations into textiles. T-shirt prints, digital prints and knits. These were greatly received by that of the fashion world, and so his career in fashion took off.
Jethro Cave in Henderson's knitwear.
I feel his range of knitwear to be his most successful, as it can prove more difficult to create a knitwear range from illustrations rather than just printed t-shirts. There is a lot more thought involved, but the outcome proves more successful I feel personally, and can appeal to a wider audience.
I find his thought process and overall outcome inspiring, and relevant to my own work. Similar to Henderson, I begin all my ideas by drawing, and love to adapt my illustrations into textiles.
Henderson's illustrations are fresh and exciting, and his audience young and edgy. He has produced a lot of printed t-shirts, and so has obtained a certain type of audience who would wear this type of style. He is not very well known, and his work is still un-commercialised and up and coming. He appeals to the young, 'arty' and 'trendy'. This puts his designs in demand, and allows him the power to update or put an edge on a designer's work, who is looking to change direction and target a younger audience.
Colin Henderson and Christopher Shannon
Henderson has recently worked alongside Christopher Shannon, in production of his Autumn/Winter 2010 collection. I saw some pictures from this collection on Henderson's blog - "Y O T O P I A". I watched the whole show on Vogue.co.uk.
The overall collection I liked. It included; shirts, collars, disjointed shirts with different fabrics, raincoats, hats, gloves and lots of outerwear. There was an interesting choice of fabrics used; waterproofs, cotton, velvet, velour, fine wool knits, PVC and mesh. There were very interesting use of shapes and positioning, however I feel Henderson's incorporated print definitely defined the project, and made it what it was.
As this was an Autumn/Winter collection the colour scheme was mainly white, black, navy and grey. Henderson's print had a "winter feel" to it too. Almost Paisley, but with Henderson's personal pixelated touch, with "CS" incorporated.
Although the basic design was interesting and exciting, Henderson's textiles made it fresh, and appealing to a certain audience.
