Click to Buy - Interview to Sofia Printer Aries's designer
Italian creative that meet classic culture and subculture
For the Click to Buy launch, we met Sofia Prantera, Aries designer, at Slam Jam. In fact, she created the photographic book with the photographer David Sims.
#1 Tell us: how and when Aries was born?
Aries was founded in 2012 by Fergus and I. We wanted to create a line that could be worn both from men and women. We do not consider the dress itself, but the media that it is. There are no limitations when creating, but the commercial ones, to which you must account nowadays.
#2 How did you and Fergus Purcell get in touch with David Sims?
David is a good friend of mine, we had parallel careers. We both started in London in the 90s and we both referred to the acid house scene. He was working in a store for surfers, while I at Slam City Skate, a shop for skaters. Lately we connected a lot, he is interested in my work, especially in reference to subcultures. He likes to always pursue new adventures, and so, we began ours.
#3 How do you come to the idea of a collaboration?
The idea arrived a couple of years ago, we were talking about it but before we found the courage to start it took us a while. After that, we’ve met the stylist of the project, Jane How,whit whom we put the design part into practice… we did’t wanted the mood to result too seasonal.
#4 Click to Buy, tell us about the project and its inspirations.
Generally, Aries inspirations come from the classic world. There are several elements or symbols like the temple for example, that are repeated from collection to collection. We are avery inspired by institutionalized Italian brands like Versace, the brand that by definition celebrates classicism. At the same time, we take inspiration from different subcultures and that creates a contrast, The temples, the columns, the gold, they get disturbed by mice and other more decaying elements. And also Click To Buy wanted to represent this aestethic: a bacchanal containing classicism, decadence and branding.
#5 Why have you decide to turn it into a papery?
I do really love books and, actually, we’ve even made a movie posted only on our Instagram account but the idea that I was feeling more “mine” was to turn all this work into something that would have remained.
