By Cassandra Pizzey / 06-10-2010

As part of a Summer Lab at V2 – an interdisciplinary institute for art, and media technology in Rotterdam – fashion designer Anouk Wipprecht created a dress that can be customized to the wearer’s liking. Thanks to a system of valves and pumps attached to a neckpiece, ink flows over the dress creating a kind of bleeding effect.

“I like bringing things to life,” says Wipprecht about her latest creation, a neckpiece that drips ink onto white dresses. During her artist-in-residency at the technical lab of V2, the designer chose to combine fashion with technology, resulting in Pseudomorphs. The dresses form an integrated part of the design and although they all have the same form, each has had distinctive material processing, ensuring the fluid is absorbed differently. “The material itself is lifeless, but by using technology to actively enhance the fabric, the product comes alive.”

Wipprecht was inspired by a cloud of ink in water, explaining, “I wanted to recreate that magical moment when the droplet hits the surface.” Aptly named Pseudomorphs -literally false form - the dresses convey the sense of water in motion and show how material is transformed by the ink.

The system works through a set of disposable post-operative control pumps, like those used in hospitals to administer anesthetics, which hold the ink. Pneumatically controlled valves are connected to a set of tubes from which the ink drips onto the dress. The whole system works on a 9V battery – integrated into the neckpiece? - making it light and wearable. “With help from the V2 Lab I developed a special circuit board allowing the wearer to control the valves,” explains Wipprecht.

Contrary to how it may look, the ink isn’t indelible. The wearer can choose to wash the staining out of the dress, or build up many layers with the fast-drying ink. “I’d like to exhibit Pseudomorphs in a museum,” says Wipprecht, “demonstrating a continuous loop of dribbling the ink onto the dress, washing it, and pumping the fluid through again. That’s what I like most about interactive installations, they’re never really finished.”

Photography courtesy of Anouk Wipprecht

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