A bizarre trend or shimmering luxury?

In the 1980s, Vivienne Westwood, Jean Paul Gaultier and Madonna were some of the people who finally established fetishism on the mainstream fashion scene. When Gianni Versace presented his Bondage collection in 1992, fetishists all over the world complained that the collection had pushed fetishism into mainstream fashion – a trend that Sara Linke is promoting with her master’s collection. This young graduate of the fashion design course in the Fakultät Angewandte Kunst (Faculty of Applied Arts) Schneeberg of the Westsächsischen Hochschule Zwickau has used latex, and combined this fetishistic material with lace to produce extravagant, special-occasion wear. Sara Linke was supported in the development of these new, innovative, composite materials by KARL MAYER Textilmaschinenfabrik GmbH and Latexmanufactur.de.

A collection that is making latex acceptable

The Obsessive Latex collection is a homage to the female form and plays with luxurious materials – woollen fabrics, silk and latex are incorporated into seven outfits to create exciting combinations. A new, vibrant design concept has also emerged by combining open, warp-knitted fabrics and lace with natural rubber, which is nurturing the “fetish fashion” trend. The result is eveningwear, whose aesthetics and elegance are showing real commitment to pleasure, fashion and femininity. The elegant apparel shows that eroticism can be combined with conventional garments. Lingerie and latex have been a hot topic for some time, and are now becoming an acceptable “dress code”.

Sara Linke combined classic garment pieces with high-end lingerie and brightened up the look with bold style elements borrowed from the twenties and the fetish scene. This daring experiment has been a huge success. The exciting collection emphasises all those feminine charms, plays subtly with the material aesthetics, and has an impressive, luxurious feel to it – the result of combining a touch of Art Déco with 1920s’ glamour. The luxury of the materials typical of the twenties, which include varnish, leather, chrome and gold, is now reflected in shimmering latex. Chokers and laces as fetish elements in the collection are placed stylishly on the garments using rings, stand-up collars and tie-belts, for example.

The design of the dresses, tops and a skirt, which are made from extravagant materials, makes them both wearable and striking. The contrasting widths in the silhouettes create a vibrant, overall look, and the trapezoidal intersecting lines send out a message that the wearer is tough and determined. Refinements like laser cuts and latex net constructions produced by hand round off the design features.