Can a sound itself be a garment? This practice-led research explores the sound of garments and fashion, which is unheard, unspoken or overheard, to suggest a new perspective for reconsidering garments and fashion. Through
experiments with making, wearing and displaying, the research examines the
sound, voice or silence embedded in garments and fashion and affective experiences aroused from garments as atmospheric spaces.
A new term, ‘dress-scape’, is introduced and discussed through a series of practical and theoretical approaches to the concept. The research suggests that the dress-scape of a garment emerges as the resonance of sound, voice,
noise or silence from the interplay between the garment and the maker, the wearer or the viewer.
As the research attempts to locate fashion in a new place, the practice varies significantly from that in conventional garments. The maker rather explores non-wearable garments, other artefacts, installation, film and sound-making
using diverse mediums. The practice, in turn, oscillates between fashion and art practice. The journal entries exist as a documentation of the maker’s reflections
on the research journey and contribute to the development of both practical and theoretical renderings of the research.
Inspired by the notion of ‘tacet’ (broadly, ‘silence’) as used in John Cage’s work, 4’33”, the research aims to invite the reader, the viewer and the listener
to be silent and to ‘listen’ to the research, together with the maker, who also acts as the author and the composer. Thus, rather than acting as a series of problem-solving investigations for knowledge acquisition, the research is essentially the journey of the investigation of the maker’s tacit awareness of other related issues including modernist artists, film, architecture, the relationship
between fashion and art, and curatorial display. This, in turn, adds to the value of the practice-led research, elevating it to an interdisciplinary study.