Brandon Race-Oak

My name is Brandon Race-Oak. What inspires me is the big appreciation I have for all aspects of fashion and craftsmanship. Alongside this, I have been into photography and been surfing since I was a young child. In 2018 I was ranked in the top 170 best surfers in the UK and in 2016 I crafted several high-performance surfboards and I was inspired by this to set it as my goal to create a platform where I can merge my three passions, creating a world where people with similar interests can be a part of and support my vision. During the many years of surfing, I have seen the devastating negative impact humans have had on earth, so it is important for me to stay 100% earth-friendly and create less impact on our planet whilst helping it at the same time through my endeavours. You can see this journey by viewing my online portfolio via Instagram (@Brace.Oak)

My project is titled The Botanicals, this is inspired by Kew Gardens during my first ever visit. This visit led to me sketching what I saw and wanting to take those sketches and experiences into a project. I wanted to create something that differs from anything I have done before by going down the Haute Couture route, aspiring to create an advanced piece of tailoring and craft for women, yet creating something that looks stunning beside my previous work to curate a copacetic product portfolio and portraying a clear understanding of my design language. With Kew Gardens as my main inspiration, this gave me a great opportunity to explore a lot of options but with great pressure executing it well. During the deep research of Kew Gardens that I explored, I wanted to capture the importance of Kew, the strong layers of history and the rare botanicals Kew holds.

With Kew Gardens dating back to the 1830s, I took inspiration from what I saw visitors wear in this era and the architecture of the famous buildings and conservatories that stand tall in the ground. This plays a part of the dress in the details, the pleated bodice represents the details on the palm house and in the embroidery, I took an abstract perspective of the palm house. Using navy embroidery to represent Kew during dusk and only seeing the beautiful silhouettes of the flowers and greenhouses. The bright colourful scarf I created using Liberty London fabric, which plays a role in the project highlighting daytime in contrast to the embroidery, giving the outfit a playful and colourful addition. The print of the scarf dates to the same date Kew was created which I imagined London visitors wore during opening day. When designing the dress for The Botanicals project I had a theme of a romantic British summer with a luxury feel, with this fantasy I captured the campaign images and video in Kew Gardens to tell the story of the meaning behind the garment.