Vexed Generation Literature

Image of Hood p.12

Image of hooded jacket p.65

Image of SABS coat (back) p.66

Image of SABS coat (side) p.67

Image of Vexed parka p.71

Quinn, Bradley ‘The Fashion of Architecture’ (Oxford: Berg, 2003) p. 23-24 & 52-54
“The London-based fashion visionaries Vexed Generation also create garments that counter surveillance. Their strategic design tactics give fashion the power to invert and deflect electronic surveillance by using visors, hoods, zips and collars to render the wearer anonymous. One of their most popular garments is the ‘Vexed Parka’, which they created as a commentary on the escalation of surveillance during the 1990s. The Vexed Parka is characterized by a hood and collar that covers most of the head and face, closing over the mouth and nose but leaving the eye area open. Adam Thorpe, who owns Vexed Generation in partnership with Joe Hunter explained: ‘We made the parka in 1994 and launched it in 1995. It sums up all the ideas and concepts we had about fashion and surveillance, which we include in most of the other clothes we have designed since.’

During the 1990s, the British government and private industry is estimated to have spent around £3 billion to establish surveillance systems and equipment. ‘For a fraction of the cost we made it pretty much redundant as the person wearing the parka can hide his face,’ Thorpe said. ‘The area in front of the mouth and nose is formed so it can take one of the filters normally used in special neoprene cycle masks.’ Though the mask was designed to look and function as a filter, it also concealed the lower half of the face.

The political climate and this time was characterized by protests and civil disobedience in response to the controversial British Criminal Justice Act and the government’s implementation of poll-tax reforms. ‘At that time we felt that civil liberties were attacked. Freedom of expression, the rights to demonstrate, assembly or party were strategically cut short. Particularly during the poll tax riots it was apparent that although holding an equally valid proposition with riot police wearing protective kit,’ Thorpe said. The parka embodied the difficult juxtaposition of civil liberties and CCTV, becoming a confrontational parody of police riot gear that protected the wearer. ‘We were interested in the possible sartorial links between the extremes. For us the garment was a kind of modelling of social situations,’ Thorpe said. This enabled the wearer to maintain a public presence and gather social and political information first hand, while remaining anonymous. Thorpe said: ‘Our clothing is about communicating what we think that is essential or important. To give people enough protection for them to be able to go out and be active, more involved with their environment in a secure fashion and more individual.’” P.23-24
“Vexed Generation have always worked outside fashion conventions. The concept behind their shop in Soho, London set out to present fashion in a public forum rather than through insider PR events. Conceived as a public space rather than a boutique or showroom, Vexed Generation created an environment where buyers, press and public could be in dialogue with the clothes and gain a sense of the concepts behind them. Adam Thorpe, one of Vexed Generations designers explained: ‘We put all of our energy into communicating the ideas through the space, through our shop because it is open all year long, anyone can walk in and experience it. Meanwhile if you do a catwalk show you rely on the press or on those who attend to communicate what they’ve seen or they’ve felt to other people.’

In architecture things are generally built to be longer lasting that they are in fashion, but Vexed Generation’s garments and shop design inverted this concept completely. The high-durability techno textiles they use make clothes that are almost impossible to wear out are far more durable than the paint, carpet and wallpaper that inadvertently wear away. Rather than constantly renovate and redecorate like most shop owners do, Vexed Generation decided to create an interior based on thematic installations, collaborating with designers, artists and musicians to create unique environments for each collection.

The first of these, opened in 1995, reflected Vexed Generation’s strong commentary on the escalation of surveillance as discussed in chapter 1. The front window was rendered opaque with several layers of white paint, which only a video monitor left visible. Onlookers could observe the shops interior by looking into the video screen. By placing the shop under the surveillance of passers-by, Vexed Generation reversed the normal security measure of recording customers by placing the screen in the public gaze.

The following year environmental themes were featured. Vexed Generation moved their shop upstairs to the first floor, where walls and display units were made from inflatable bags powered rhythmically by an air compressor. The effect was that of ‘breathing’ walls and ‘breathing’ clothes, echoing the role of trees functioning as the ‘lungs of the planet’. In its next phase, the shop was transformed into a grow room. The garment displays were aligned in rows, like fields of crops waiting to be harvested. Around them fast-growing ivy, clematis and passiflora grew up through the clothing, sprouting from necklines and cuffs, drawing attention to natures bounty. Blackboards lined the walls inviting customers to share their personal details as a statement encouraging public access to information.

The plasticene floor in the gallery space started off as pure blue surface that would be worn down with each footprint, recording the traces of each visitor and accelerating the process of erosion day by day. ‘We were interested in its weathering capabilities and in concepts of quality and tradition and longevity,’ Joe Hunter explained. ‘It was also our ludite approach to surveillance, because we were tracking people without using digital technology,’ he said. At one point the floor was covered in £750 worth of one penny coins to illustrate the concept of safety in numbers: large sums of money could be accessed by the public yet not be removed.

The shop was later themed ‘A Stitch in Time’, featuring an installation called ‘The Label Database’. Rather than fitting conventional heating insulation and concealing it with a flush surface, the shop’s interior was padded with the same quilting used in the garments. ‘We did that to slow things down,’ Thorpe explained. ‘Before that people could scribble their names and orders on the wall, but we put the padding up so that they could embroider their names, which took them longer to do. Later on we printed out labels for each order that had the customers name on it. One was sewn into the clothes, the other was sewn up on the wall, mimicking the way big retailers build a name and address database to keep records of their customers,’ he said.

Vexed Generation’s work tends to ignore short-tem trends, notions of exclusivity and product branding by placing emphasis on protection and durability. They also innovate by guaranteeing high performance standards for their clothes, achieved through hi-tech textiles and functional design. ‘With our garments, and as a philosophy, we go against the mainstream of production where the products are designed to last a determined period of time through concepts of cheapness and disposability. We are fundamentally against that and that’s why our garments are intended to endure keeping their qualities,’ Thorpe said. Vexed Generation’s uncompromising perspectives on the standards and values of their designs outlines a durability of materials and structures more common to architecture than fashion. As they eschew the transient styles of fashion and the use of outmoded fabric, they inject fashion with an element of sustainability that promises to extend its value long after its shelf life.” P. 52-54

Rogers, Brett ‘Fabric of Fashion’ (London: The British Council, 2000) No page numbers.

Adam Thorpe and Joe Hunter comprise Vexed Generation. Their style of menswear is urban streetstyle combined with military apparel. Their choice of fabric is generally high-performance and includes billet-proof ballistic nylon and smart materials that respond to their environment. The materials are layered, padded and quilted. The design of both clothes and accessories reflect the source of the fabrics in protective applications.

Neither received a conventional fashion or textile training. Thorpe studied Microbiology at Kingston University, while Hunter attended Middlesex University to study graphics. They met in London’s Portobello Road. At the time Thorpe was working in the music industry and as a sportswear consultant, mainly for Puma. Hunter was involved with a clothing label specialising in recycling clothes. They shared a common interest in social and political issues and decided to use clothing as a means of communication. At the time they met, the Criminal Justice Bill was being debated in parliament attracting media and public attention. Thorpe and Hunter decided to use the bill with its associated issues of civil liberties as a brief for their work. Lacking the technical expertise of pattern-cutting, they decided to take a year out to teach themselves the technical aspects of designing and making garments. This was done mainly through books and manuals. Vexed Generation was launched in 1994.

When asked about the importance of fabric in their work, Hunter’s immediate reply was that “Our cloth is as primary as our style. You can’t make a shape without having the right cloth”. Most of their fabric suppliers produce high-performance technical textiles for military and protective clothing. Over the years they have developed a relationship with these textile manufacturers who view their demands as a challenge. The duo are behind many of the textile innovations we have seen in recent years such as Teflon coated denim, resin impregnated polyamide and the use of ballistic nylon for non-military applications. Their work with the fabric does not end with manufacturing and finishing treatments but extends to garment cutting and assembly. Textiles are often layered and quilted for reasons of aesthetics as well as performance. A layered fabric from Vexed might include a line of Outlast and an outer layer of ballistic nylon, providing protection to the wearer from climate changes and gunfire. Outlast uses a micro-encapsulation technique to incorporate a Phase Change Material (PCM) that has the ability to change its state depending on temperature. Outlast is more usually used in sportswear or protective clothing to provide the wearer with their own climate-controlled environment, keeping they warm in winter and cool in summer.

Vexed Generation are keen to establish that their work is not just about social issues. They are happy to provide interesting shapes with new solutions, usually in the form of fabric innovation. Comfort is important, as they believe their clothes should be comfortable to wear, regardless of seasons or climate changes. This is not unlike the performance demanded by protective and military clothing specifications so it is no surprise that many of their fabrics should originate from the same source.

Smith, Courtenay & Topham, Sean ‘Xtreme Fashion’ (London: Prestel Publishing, 2005) p 50-53
“London based fashion label Vexed Generation was at the forefront of the 1990’s trend for tough, urban street wear. The Vexed Parka was part of the label’s debut collection in 1995 and was designed in response to the heavy-handed tactics used by the authorities in the UK to control demonstrators at rallies against the Criminal Justice Act in the early 1990s.

The parka closely resembles the body armour worn by frontline police officers and is designed to offer protection from physical assaults. Joe Hunter and Adam Thorpe, the designers behind Vexed Generation, noticed that when such demonstrations turn nasty, riot police tend to try and debilitate demonstrators by using their truncheons to hit them in the groin or around the lower back. The Vexed Parka is padded to offer protection around the spine and kidneys and also comes with a between-the-legs fastening to shield the groin area. To ensure that the coat is as tough as it looks, the designers employ a slash-proof and fire-resistant nylon that was originally developed for use in blast-proof curtains and protective flak jackets. The designers used riot gear as their inspiration and from it developed a range of protective clothing well suited to cycling, riding scooters and similar exposed forms of urban transportation. Concerns about the increasing use of CCTV play a major role in the shaping of Vexed Generation’s Ninja Hood and Ninja High-Neck Tops. Inspired by the bad-boy cool of hooded sweatshirts and zip-up tracksuit tops sported by teenagers the world over, the garments were designed to raise awareness about the use of video surveillance in public areas. The vexed garments have high necklines that can be worn over the lower half of the face to conceal the identity of the person wearing them. These clothes aren’t designed to encourage criminal activity, but they help level out the field when those in charge start abusing their powers. More that anything they appear to express apprehension about the erosion of civil liberties such as the right to protest. Fashion is a means for the people behind Vexed Generation to communicate their ideas about pressing social and political issues to a wider audience.

Van Kopplen, Anthea and Vaughan, Laurene ‘Engaging in Fashion’ (From Website)
Vexed Generation, the designers of one shoulder rucksack have had an eye for sustainability since 1994. A British duo, the pair only makes their bags in Britain, “so we can have a relationship with the people who work for us” (Buttolph 1994 p.98). They are also inspired by political issues, their Wrap Liberation was born out of the juxtaposition between the elegance of Dior’s Normandie jacket and by the desolation of street people wrapped in blankets. The Wrap Liberation is a length of cloth that can be interpreted by the wearer. Wearers participate in this design through emotional and pragmatical desires. The desire to identify with the desolation perhaps and the desire to have a flexible functional piece of clothing that can protect from desolation.
Vexed Generation took on the political with their Wrap Liberation by raising the awareness of the condition of the homeless and with their statement on their general approach to outworkers.