A designer’s perspective with Morgan Timuri

I had the pleasure of interviewing designer Morgan Timuri on her perspective on design, art, and personal style.

Where are you currently studying and where do you hope to branch out with your creative endeavors? What are some other forms of creative expression you enjoy besides fashion?

I’m currently studying Fine Art at Central Saint Martins in London. I hope to be able to experiment with as much as I possibly can within fashion and find what I think is fun to work with and also find what I really don’t like. other than sewing clothes and fashion I recently got into metalwork which is very hands-on and I think I love it so much because it’s the only thing you can focus on when you’re doing it and there’s so much you can do with it and so much that hasn’t been done yet so I can take it out of its stereotypical context and bring it into my own!

You have created an entire world for yourself. What was its origin?

The origin of the world I’ve created for myself really just began with me trying to see what I can make for myself rather than making art for other people and once I became comfortable with what I made for myself then I was more confident sharing that with others. I probably started this about 2 1/2 years ago and now it’s blossomed into something so fun and exciting my brand name 013lei represents a conjunction of letters and numbers that I think look pretty together but also the 013 is my birthdate and ‘Lei’ is a nickname that my two best friends started to call me.

As far as your creative process goes, where does it begin? What are some of your inspirations that commence a concept?

when thinking about my creative process I can’t really pinpoint a moment where it begins. it kind of never ends for me because I’m so involved in being creative with my brand and at uni and being around my friends are also creative too so I feel like I’m always in the atmosphere to make and think of ideas and I think that plays a part of inspiring me and to come up with a concept.

All your pieces are handmade by you and have a very distinct visual, what do you hope your customers take away from your brand?

by having every piece of mine handmade or having a hand finished element, I want people to be able to wear my clothes and feel those personal touches because I see my pieces as something quite intimate and I want that to be cherished and recognised. apart from seeing me in the clothes that I make I want people to be able to see themselves as a part of the pieces that they’re wearing and be able to mould themselves in the clothes that I’ve made for them.

Being that you hand make your garments, and have a very high demand for your pieces, do you think you will reach a point where you reach out to a manufacturer?

Hand making all my pieces, it does get very overwhelming and takes a lot of hard work, so in the future I do think I’d like to think about getting a few helping hands, but still finishing the final details and personal touches myself.

what are your inspirations while dressing yourself? How does your methods and beliefs while dressing yourself translate to your designs?

I think over the past few years I’ve changed my style a lot and would try to embody many different styles at the same time and now I feel like I filtered it down to a select few style of pieces that I enjoy wearing and suits me. I don’t know if there’s a distinct inspiration behind anything because I don’t actively look for inspiration on style I just kind of put things on and see what feels most like me. there are times where I’ll see something on the Internet and think I have to recreate this outfit for fun and that’s where a lot of my outfit pictures blossomed from in the first place was re-creating outfits that I hadn’t really tried out before and styles that I wasn’t familiar with and then I begin to find out what I like suits me. This translates to the clothes I make because I want people to put things on and for it to feel like them and feel familiar to them. that’s why I have things that you can wear multiple ways, so that there is no set way for you to have to wear something - you can choose different ways come up with your own style and it’s a lot more fun - I think the best thing in fashion and dressing up and finding a style is having fun.

You recently created a dress and had classmates have free reign on it. Where did this idea stem from? What is your perspective on exploring the blurred boundaries between fashion and artistic expression?

The dress I created where I had my classmates do whatever they wanted to it was inspired by the performance art of Marina Abramović and her performance titled 72 objects. I allowed people in the class to use any object they wanted on the dress and just documented what they did. At first many people were hesitant because they didn’t want to ruin a pretty dress, but slowly people warmed up to the idea! I think because I’m studying fine art, it gives me the opportunity to have more artistic expression than if I was studying fashion because the courses and their criteria is all very different and tutors expect different things from you on each course and fine art is definitely one of the most free and individual courses to be on. It allowed me to be able to still express myself through the medium of fashion but in the context of art that i’m interested in. Performance art isn’t something i’ve done before so having the opportunity and environment to give it a try was really so much fun!

What can we expect to see of 013lei in the future? What is your ultimate goal for your creative experience/career?

I couldn’t really tell you what the future for 013lei but I would like to keep growing with it for the meantime and see where it takes me. I think I just want to keep making throughout my life, whether that be clothes or something totally different and that really is my ultimate goal.

You can follow Morgan along on her twitter

and visit her website