Martin Margiela

Martin Margiela (born April 9, 1957 in Genk, Belgium) is a Belgian fashion designer. He studied at Antwerp's Royal Academy of Fine Arts along with the legendary avantgarde fashion collective the Antwerp Six. .After graduation in 1980 he worked as a freelance designer for five years. He has worked for the likes such as Jean Paul Gaultier, Hermes, Rei Kawakubo and Comme des Garcon. He has managed to change the fashion scene by their eccentric designs. The concept of deconstruction, 
also embraced by the 
aforementioned Rei Kawakubo, is 
important for the understanding of Martin Margiela's fashion statement. Mr Margiela famously redesigns by hand objects such as old wigs, canvases and silk scarves into couture garments. He revolts aganist luxurious fashion world with garments of oversized proportions such as long arms, and with linings, seams and hems on the outside.


Throughout his career, Martin Margiela has maintained an extremely low profile. He has never had his picture taken and remains backstage after his shows. Maison Martin Margiela’s ultradiscreet trademark consists of a piece of cloth with the numbers 0-23. The badge is attached to the inside with its four little white pick stitches, exposed to the outside on unlined garments. For the 20'th anniversary the anonymous tag was replaced by a classic logotype.