Petra Fagerstrom, the Designer Rethinking Figure-Skating Glamour

"The machine, which looks a bit like a relic of heirloom sewing, produces precise rows of parallel gathers usually destined for smocking or shibori. The Swedish designer has other ideas. 'I need to see if I can make it work with my lenticular pleating,' she says. She reaches for a half-finished piece: a length of fabric printed in two directions, soon to be hand-sewn and ironed into the three-dimensional image flips that have become something of a signature."

"The process is slow and exacting - hours of stitching before the pleats are coaxed into place, but the effect is worth it. The garments seem to shift as you move around them like fragments of memory coming into focus. Which is a great metaphor for Fagerström's work more broadly. Her collections often begin with recollections before being translated into clothes that feel severe and strangely intimate."

"Still only a year out of a Masters at Central Saint Martins, the Swedish designer has quickly established a distinctive language of outerwear and eveningwear spliced together into fierce silhouettes that suggest glamour under pressure."

Petra Fagerström is a Swedish designer who creates distinctive lenticular pleated garments using a repurposed princess pleater machine in her Smithfield Market studio. Her signature technique involves printing fabric in two directions, hand-sewing, and ironing pleats into three-dimensional forms that create visual shifts as viewers move around them. Recently graduated from Central Saint Martins, Fagerström has developed a distinctive design language combining outerwear and eveningwear into fierce silhouettes. Her collections begin with personal recollections translated into clothes that feel both severe and intimate. Raised in Gothenburg, she learned sewing as a competitive figure skater, drawn to the spectacle of costumes and performance.

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