Cast By Shadows
Cast By Shadows
BY THE TIDES, BY THE WAVES
Photography - Marinó Thorlacius
Model - Emil Þór Guðmundsson and Helgi Hjörvar
Stylist - Megan Herbert
Lookbook Layout - wearenotyou
...And To Your Scattered Bodies Go
Accompanying film to Cast By Shadows, Spring Summer 2012.
The Man - Emil Þór Guðmundsson
The Directors:
In Space - Sruli Recht
On Earth - Megan Herbert
The Producer - Sruli Recht
The Editor - Steffanía Thors
The Sound/ Music - Valgeir Sigurðssonthe
Post - Jóhann Reynissonthe
Camera - Andri Ómarssonthe
Story Tellers - Sruli Recht, Megan Herbert
The Crew - Höskuldur Elefsen
- William Lloyd Thomas
With Special Thanks To
Kukl
Luxus
Dive.is
Sundlaug Hafnarfirði
Greenhouse Studios
Sruli Recht Studio
STORY
This is the second complete menswear line from Sruli Recht.
“This collection is based on the view from my window: water, mountains, mist.” - Sruli Recht, June, 2011
The collection in three words - draped, refined, digital
MATERIALS
This season employs a global selection of cottons, linens, silks and timber, complimented by Icelandic reindeer skin and horse skin. All the buttons are made from metal alloy rods, drop-cast in the studio, and blackened.
Shark skin from the Icelandic basking shark is the highlight material invented for this collection. One day outside my studio I saw a flatbed truck driving past, and on that truck a pile of wet glistening somethings. My brain said it was fishing nets... but that sharp little voice at the back of my neck disagreed: "That there pile was once alive. Chase it. Chase it down.” And into my car I got, and followed that truck till it stopped. And on it? Five, reaking collosal beasts, brown, wet and far beyond dead. "To where will these sharks go?" I asked. "West," said the driver, "to the plants where they become oil and meat." Procuring the recipient’s number, I dialed and requested slithers of its mic-rose thorn skin to be sent to the Tanner in the North, for whom the impossible is but a days work. Twelve days later, in a relatively anonimous white cardboard box we received from his skilled blades a new first — basking shark (or shark skin, or whatever name you want to give it), and by far not the last first, from his skilled blades, baths and alchemical knowhow. See it, smell it, but recoil from its iron maiden touch... for the skin of the shark is more dangerous than its bite.
GARMENTS
The collection consists of a total look - from coats, jackets and cardigans, to trousers, shorts and leggings, complimented by sandals, eye-frames, bags, hats, gloves and silver jewellery - 42 styles, approximately 100 with material variations.
All garments and product samples are produced in-house unless otherwise stated. Jewellery is beaten by Sign. Frames and cane hand-carved by Muggi.
The majority of the garments are constructed from one pattern piece and one piece of material, where the width of the material allows. I.e. In the case of the shirts, the cuff and placket come from the same piece of fabric as the sleeve, which is also part of the body and collar. The jacket Fourteen Years, is constructed with a side seam, and one positioned dart that flows from the bottom of the scapula, up over the shoulder and through to the neck, creating an elegantly tailored revere collar. This jacket is named so as its construction represents the culmination of 14 years of patternmaking experience.
Everything in the collection is made in Iceland.
Show Piece One - Shaper Mechanist
and he heard me fall
before I heard it myself
a Shaper, Mechanist
Icelandic horse skin, dredge-dyed canvas, drop-cast button, bleeding fingers.
Show Piece Two - Seal My Vest
seal my vest
on my heavy chest
where the heaving rests
and the rhythm lets
Icelandic wild seal, drop-cast button, dead-stock lining.
Feature Pieces: Limited Non-Products from the new collection of Sruli Recht for Spring and Summer, 2011, Cast By Shadows.
SR302 - Qanah - Beam of Balance: is an aerodynamic hand-carved bleached white cane for the visually impaired, shaped in reference to the wing struts of the early aircrafts. Made from Larch, the cane is sun-bleached, rubbed down with black horse hide, and tipped with rubber.
SR303 - Stone Blind: is a pair of frames for the visually impaired, hand-carved and bent from Cherry wood with hand-cut Carrara marble lenses.
The man who heard it all, everything... when it happened
He knew the sound of anything hitting the floor
He could tell you exactly what had fallen
from anywhere, and to the ground.
With his ears, he could hear the specific sound of every object in the world, and the impact it made, in
its terminal dance with gravity and the Earth
A pen, a quoin, or your heart. if it could fall, he could tell you what it was.
And he would always find something in that exact moment it was lost… but never in the minutes
thereafter, nor the second before.
For everyone has lost something they once had.
Once held in regard, and now supported by a surface
He swore:
“what I hear, is what I heard.
Always after, and never before.
Evermore.
Evermore.”
SR337 - Where X Marks: is a hand-made wooden bag, securing a canvas inner. A block of Poplar is cut into 17 slats before the edges are hand-softened with 5 custom-made sanding jigs and left to be sunbleached. The hand-cut knobs on the water-bent Ash handle unscrew at one end to slide through the bars on a bike saddle.
SR328 - A Jester’s Crown: Hand-made hat from wool and beaver felt, reindeer skin band, silk organza lining, shaped on our unique carved block.
SR330 - Cap Sandal, SR331 - Strap Sandal: Water-pressed laser-cut soles, ash whitened, and hand stitched in a gruelling 12-hour process. In horse and wild reindeer skins, and a special edition in basking shark.
Jewellery is produced by Sign EHF: hand-made black silver jewellery - the offset of crushed black silver, against the perfection of the white silver staple. Man and his nature, in a harmonic grasp.
SR315c - Bró: Sharkskin chest-brace. Wearable with thorns facing out, or against the skin.
tireless tireless, oh endless black swimming
ceaseless and breakless in these ever dark currents
and these excellent hard gestures of the minimal stark winnings?
for the half shark, half man - that is the motion’s beginnings
...and lost in the spinning, hard swells in the deep end
sharp spells where I descend, I feint to defend,
and start to ascend
for that is the devotion, of the half stark wired man
the inflicted warm presence of the needles’ marked measure.
these moments I treasure. and the others - forced to surrender
bang bang, on my chest, the emotional slang where it rests.
these moments I treasure.
and the others - forced to surrender
bang bang, on my chest,
the emotional slang where it rests.
There was once a man, I heard, who wore a vest lined with nails that were worn pressed against the skin. He'd said, when distracted from design he would bang his fists on his chest, driving those nails in, hard... fast. And so, in vain, I wore the skin against my body for a half a day - it was not comfortable, and it didn't help with concentration.
*The following two items are omitted from lookbook*
SR341a - A First Impression: Is a basking sharkskin glove, with the mic-rose thorns facing out. For one likes to leave a first impression.
Lethal lethal,
my right fist and its sequels
SR341b - A Lasting Impression: Is a basking sharkskin glove, with the mic-rose thorns inside.
Should you put your hand in, you will discover that the thorns, all directed to slant inward, will lock your hand in place in the manner of, ten thousand fishhooks. Should you attempt to remove it, the thousands of thorns will bite into the skin. You can put the gloves on, but to remove them would mean to cut them off. Gloves for life, or for one wear - the ultimate and final commitment.