Studio Too Good: Set Design meets Visual Merchandising

My lecture yesterday introduced us to set design/conceptual websites. 'Faye Too Good' or 'Studio too Good' in particular caught my eye...

On my visit to their website, I went on the 'space' section where I found their collaboration with Hermes for their Petit h collection. Hermes Petit h was established to use the brands off cuts and rejected stock. Playing on the idea of their stock being 'butchered' and reworked, the installation is dripping with thick blood. This notion of re-creation is referenced in the shop windows of where the installation was made, Bond Street (Hermes Flagship store).

It features heavy-duty scissors, along ​​with other equipment used in re purposing their unused stock. Draped red fabric makes up the background for the shop windows, continuing the narrative.

My favourite part of the installation however is the garment hung on meat hooks, including the shape of off-cuttings from Hermes bags. I feel this embodies the metaphor of the installation completely. The fabric is hanging up, ready to be reworked just like meat is hung up ready to be cut up and packaged and re purposed as food for us.

When I first saw this work by Studio Too Good I thought it was extremely reminiscent of Anish Kapoors piece 'Svayambh' which used Wax and oil-based paint to create an installation that seemed as though it was 'skinning itself' (Kapoor 2009). The blood in Studio Too Good's installation was created using scarlet-pigmented resin. The installation offers an antidote to 'West End slickness' (FayeTooGood).