TURNING THE FAMILIAR INTO THE EXTRAORDINARY WITH ALEXANDER WANG 

From ruched halter dresses in hosiery jerseys to diamanté charm bikini strap adorned asymmetric skirts, off-shoulder shirts to scrunchie-inspired bag handles, there’s an inherent playfulness to Alexander Wang’s designs. “My kind of girl is a little rough around the edges, very natural, very individual,” he told i-D back in 2009, four years after launching his eponymous brand and establishing himself as the de facto uniform-maker for the model-off-duty look that captivated downtown New York and far beyond. “She wears what makes her feel comfortable, it's always easy, and it never looks put together. Yet at the same time, it's always just a little bit off. She's never afraid to be a bit of a bad girl or a little rebellious.” He, and the women he designs for, have always delighted in duality. Expectations are continually challenged, perceptions constantly tested, and desires playfully pushed. Sexy yet androgynous, provocative yet refined, high yet low, Alexander Wang’s modern vision of femininity reflects modern womanhood. Eager to accentuate the playfulness of this season’s must-have wardrobe, LN-CC commissioned Ukrainian artist Hanne Zaruma to integrate Alexander Wang into her everyday fantasy-imbued, forgotten tech-reimagined, cut-and-pasted world.

“With my work I want to show that it is not necessary to have money to make art,” Hanne Zaruma told Vogue back in 2020, at the moment her forgotten tech repositioned artworks ignited Insta-imaginations. From the moment a self portrait piece that dissected her features across several early 00s mobile screens quickly turned into a viral face filter that amassed 11 million views in a week, the former law student and model’s multidisciplinary work has continually stopped the scroll. “Zaruma’s visual language is witty and razor-sharp,” declared The Calvert Journal earlier this year as the New East-dedicated publication celebrated her knack for combining images of everyday consumerist gadgets and technology with nature and life. From USB tongues to money-made bed companions, “pull me off” ads to keyboard sliders and nunchaku handbags, handcuffed feed scrolls to water cooler showers and ATMs dispensing cheese squares, Zaruma blurs physical and augmented realities to turn the familiar into the unexpected, the discarded into the double-take, the forgotten into the celebrated. This ability to enchant the everyday mirrors Alexander Wang’s own approach, albeit through a distorted magic mirror.

“My creative process is like magic,” Zaruma told METAL in a recent feature. “The idea comes from nowhere, and then the necessary materials seem to find me.” Well, for this collaboration, LN-CC ensured the necessary Alexander Wang pieces found her, but left much of the magic for her to conjure. The resulting commission sees a (scrunchie bag post it covered) head-to-(stud embellished) toe Alexander Wang selection weave seamlessly into her practice. From keyboard bikini lines to collaging yesterday’s mobiles and taking over billboards, Zaruma disrupts everyday routines and encourages us all to see the beauty around us.

I do what I feel, and in my work I want to make the viewer believe in magic, escape from routine and see the beauty in ordinary things.

– Hanne Zaruma