Design, Beauty and Fidelity

At the Disseny Hub Barcelona, there is still (hurry up, it's ending soon) two wonderful exhibitions.

One of them is the Maria Brillas collection of dresses designed by couturier Pedro Rodriguez in the 1930-1980. Fortunately, the collection will remain at the Barcelona Textile Museum as it has been donated by its owners.

A look at the dress in the first picture is enough to get an idea of the artistry trapped in those amazing pieces. It was design in 1935. At first glance, it is just a lovely flounce dress, in nice colours it is true, but just that. Once you stare at it more closely, you realize that the shadows of the flounces are actually done in a different fabric. Those violet streeps under the flounces reinforce the “shadow effect”, whenever there is in fact shadow under them, and they create “shadow illusions” in the waist of the dress, when it fits the body to enhance Doña Maria’s beautiful figure. Brillas wore it, for the first time, 40 years after it was elaborated at the 80th anniversary of Rodriguez (second picture). That is fidelity.

The other exhibition is the Mediterranean Design Prizes. Interesting to see what our young designers think the image of the Med should be today and how they present it. The winner is a typographic project by an Italian designer done with natural products, like tomatoes, anchovies and so on. Don't miss it either.