Winter Garden – Ilana Efrati’s Winter 15 Collection

Ilana Efrati’s collection for winter 2015 is part of her on-going project about the interplay between nature and design. Efrati created a series of hand-printed natural textiles using vegetal pigments she extracted from plants collected in the Italian country-side. The inspiration for her hand-printed textiles are the changing colours of the seasons in nature. The deep shades of winter – blue, deep brown and purple – are naturally created from buds, flowers and leaves that grow during that time of year. The textiles become a diary documenting nature’s richness visual aesthetics. Efrati’s original textiles were on show in art galleries in Tel Aviv and Venice.

In the Winter 2015 production of the Israeli designer Ilana Efrati, the basic conventions of the fashion world are abandoned in favour of a return to nature. In protest against the exaggerated attention to the female body and appearance in fashion photography, Efrati decided that her ‘models’ will be plants, leaves and twigs. The aim is to divert the discussion from the limiting and stressful bodily image dictated to women by the fashion world, and concentrate on the natural beauty of nature which inspired relaxation and happiness.

To lead a happy life, humans need to keep in close touch with nature. Nature can be a bunch of flowers we buy home for the weekend, or a little back yard behind an urban building. Efrati decided to photograph common and accessible plants that anyone in Israel can easily find and enjoy: philodendron, ficus, and palm tree. There is no need to go to faraway exotic destinations to see the beauty of nature. The production encourages us to focus on what brings us every-day joy, like natural beauty and high-quality design, and ignore the dictates of the world of fashion and glam.

The coats are made of superb raw materials, including leather, cashmere, Italian wool and linen. A limited edition of coats feature original silk stamped fabrics designed by Ilana Efrati and made in Italy.