Elisabeth Donovan

Nature necessarily moves on, infinitely transforming itself, adapting, evolving, forever locked in a constant state of fluidity and flux… Taking this natural paradigm as a template for his own clothing ranges, Marki Liu’s ‘Zero Waste’ fashion attempts to expand upon previous notions of ecologically minded clothing, providing a series of innovative and intricate patterns that merge and combine with one another in an endless jigsaw of fabric, which can also be summed by a minimal waste of fabric.


 The inventive and progressive ideas of this London-based, Australian designer are best seen in his use of traditional Kimonos, Indians Saris, Greek Chitins and Indonesian Sarongs’s way of making patterns. Until now this technique, used in the eighties by large companies, always ended in failure, mainly because of the difficulty of producing ‘larger’ sizes for curvier bodies, making the patterns trickier to design.

But Liu thinks his current obsession can be used  in both mass production as well as in limited edition couture collections, assuring a ”green future without compromisingquality”.

His remarkable debut collection ‘On the cutting Edge’ (Winter 2009), inspired by the concept of ‘Brinksmanship’ (in risky ordangerous situations pushed to their extremes) has subsequently been exhibited in various museums in the UK, US, China, India, Korea and Denmark. Together with some of India’s top designers, Liu’s  most recent venture has been in representing the UK at an international fashion show in New Delhi, organised by the British Council, MADI and the National Geographic Channel to celebrate ‘Earth Day’. 

Liu appreciates the strange, anarchic forms of nature, and uses high tech fabrics pushing new boundaries. His remarkable and avant-garde eco ideas also take their form from his heuristic work method, itself based on research and experimentation. “It is trial and error until you discover something new or get an idea right” he explained. “Most of the time your experiments will fail, but the ones that work you refine until they look effortless. The very set up of your studio and your business model create a formula on how to design like an algorithm. Algorithms can always guarantee an outcome, but the result is generally formulatic. You risk more when using a heuristic process and that’s why your results will either be spectacularly good or bad!”
He answered some questions for us:

How did you get into fashion?
I was really into sculpture, industrial design, science, psychology, sociology and art as a teenager. Put them together and you get fashion.

Growing up were you described as an “arty” ?
I probably was described that way, but I did a bit of everything. I was geeky and analytical and also did a lot of sports.

What inspires you?
At the moment I am mainly inspired by developments in science, psychology and ecology.

Do you look at or follow trends? Do you pay attention to what other the designers are doing?
I try to consume as much fashion as possible, I’ll look at every catwalk video, look through every collection, then try to do something that I have not seen. I follow the trends of eco design which are mainly dictated by the development of new materials, techniques or research. Try to see what is happening with trends and other designers and then find my own voice.

Do you have any guilty pleasures?
I like to jog around London late at night listening to music.

What is more important in fashion, shock or beauty?
I like to carry through a concept so I leave shock or beauty up to the viewer. Personally I prefer beauty.
You’ve worked with significant designers such as Alexander McQueen and Miss Selfridge. How did you find working with them? What did you learn?
McQueen was a lot of hard work and it was nice to get a brief and just design some textiles. Miss Selfridge was more like digging for trends. I learned a lot about how the studios worked and how to work under pressure.

Who is your favourite Australian designer?
Probably Akira Isogawa.

Who do you admire? And why?
I think Shai Agassi is pretty cool! He’s the CEO of a company called a Better Place and which is building an electric car network in Israel. I think he really understands that going green is not a compromise in lifestyle, but the next frontier for industry and entrepreneurship. He has the money, the technology, political co-operation and vision to get things done. I really admire that!

Something you’ve learnt that hasn’t been taught to you at school?
Without taking real risks in your work you stand to gain very little.

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Special thanks to SP