Fashion in signature collections is selling your take on style and designing what you love and want to wear. Esther Sandler goes to the next level not only designing stunning collectible textiles, fashion and ceramics, she creates the surface design based on things that bring her joy. Her message in design is one deeper than adorning our selves and our homes with beautiful things. Esther tells a story of changing seasons, new blooms, a walk in the forest. The emotions Esther feels in these moments are translated for us using her paintbrush. Since first discovering Esther’s work under her label Togetherness Design, I’ve been a huge fan. Esther is supremely talented, her textile work is modern yet nostalgic, it was so wonderful to interview Esther for the Next State Journal and find out more about her process and inspiration.
Esther Sandler
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
Tell us a little about your background – what led you to becoming a designer and creating Togetherness Design which runs as a multi-disciplinary design studio?
I grew up in Perth and loved sewing and making my own clothes when I was younger so decided to study Fashion and Textiles for 3 years after high school. This really ignited my love of textile design, so after working in the industry a little, I moved to Melbourne, completed a degree in Textile Design at RMIT, worked as a full time textile designer for a bit and then decided to take the plunge and work for myself full time. At the moment I combine working on my own label Togetherness Design with teaching textile design (back at the course I originally studied at RMIT!) and freelance design / commissions. It’s a great mix of different types of work, that at times can be hard to juggle, but it means that I get to work within different parts of the industry!
Much of your print work features original paintings of foliage, botanicals and off-beat line work, how did you become fascinated by these elements?
I am really drawn to botanical / foliage elements because I love gardening, going for walking in nature, seeing the seasons change and watching new plants come to life. It brings me a sense of calmness, fascination and wonder. I’ve embraced an imperfect and off-beat approach to painting, drawing and generating linework simply because I am not and never will be technically amazing at drawing in a realistic way – I just don’t have the talent for it!
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
You have a signature style to your painting did it always come naturally or did it evolve over time?
I’ve always been drawn to certain things within my work and these are just elements I love deeply and continue to use because they bring me joy! Despite pushing myself to experiment with my work, I’ll always end up coming back to using bold and off-beat colour combinations, inky brushstrokes and botanical motifs. I feel that my handwriting style is a constant evolution – at the moment I am trying to allow myself to be imperfect within my work, to generate ideas without thinking too much and without expectation on how the finish product will look.
Can you give us a little insight into your process? Is each work pre-planned or created very intuitively?
As my label has evolved I begun to plan the work a little bit more, but still allow myself the freedom to explore other ideas when they come up! I’ve started designing one big collection a year, with additional designs/products that I add in as I like throughout the year. For the main collection I will do a lot of research and planning and approach it like a proper design project, but the additional designs will be less planned and more spontaneous.
When designing a collection do you start with the colour palettes, prints or the products first?
I’m in the process of designing my main collection at the moment and have approached all of these components kind of simultaneously. I am researching ideas for prints and products and planning these as I come up with ideas for colour palette. Each of these components is flexible to each other, as sometimes I’ll find that a colour I really want to use just isn’t working in a collection or a print isn’t suitable for a particular garment. I love having a variety of options in terms of print, fabric and colour within my collection so its important that everything is working well together.
How do you find inspiration for new print designs, do you seek it out or are you full of inspired moments to translate to print?
It’s a mix of seeking out ideas and having brainwaves! At times I’ll have some ideas for the colours I want to use or how I want the print to look on the body or the mood / feeling of the design and then I will seek out inspiration to help me fill in this idea and generate artwork. Sometimes I’ll have a really strong idea from the start – my recent Backyard Harvest design came to me in a brainwave and was really quick and easy for me to create as I knew exactly how I wanted it to look. And then conversely some ideas will be so hard to generate, particularly when it comes to creating coordinates or quieter prints to sit back with louder ones, and often I’ll have to generate lots of ideas in order to come up with something I am happy with.
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
What other designers are you loving at the moment?
I came across the work of Luke Edward Hall recently and am really obsessed! His linework has a beautiful freedom to it and his subject matter often references historical and botanical elements which I also love. He has recently done a collab with Lucy Folk too!
Since the inception of Togetherness Design what are the projects you are most proud of?
I’ve had a lot of proud moments along the way. I’m managed to do some amazing commission for brands like Mecca Cosmetica, Swisse, Etsy, Frankie Magazine and Oekaki. With the label, I am most proud of my recent collection Fiore that launched at the end of 2017. I was lucky enough to have a photoshoot of the collection featuring my friend Hilary Green, taken by Michaela Barca, and it looks like a proper fashion collection!!! I am proud of the prints and garments styles and am heartwarmed to have received lovely feedback from people.
What are you looking forward to for the rest of 2018?
I’m looking forward to designing another collection that will hopefully top my previous one and encourage me to know that I am on the right track in terms of what I am doing, because its easy to be doubtful! I’ve got a holiday to the USA planned in a month’s time so I am hoping to get really inspired and have some crazy experiences that I can use as fuel for this next body of work.
Links
www.instagram.com/togethernessdesign
www.etsy.com/shop/esthersandler
www.pinterest.com/esthersandler
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design
‘Fiore’ SS18 by Togetherness Design