Caroline Zimbalist’s Dream World

March 15, 2023

After spending an afternoon with Caroline Zimbalist in her Brooklyn-based studio, it became apparent that she occupies a world of her own. Zimbalist’s world looks like a sunset fading into the horizon of a glassy sea, infused with every color on the spectrum. Her world is fantastical, informed by avant-garde artists that came before her, the natural world that prospers around us, and her rampant imagination.

Zimbalist has always sought a proper outlet through which to invite others into that prismatic world. At just three years old, she began painting and sketching and later went on to attend Parsons, where she gained a degree in textile and fashion design. But employing the textiles that are available to most designers wasn’t enough for Zimbalist — she desired to put her own creative stamp on all of her wearable artworks, by wholly creating her own material. Now, Zimbalist’s Bio-plastic wonders are ushering in a moment that signals the future of fashion, and she shares her universe with audiences from New York City and beyond.

Interview by Kayla Curtis-Evans
Photos Courtesy of Caroline Zimbalist

Tell me a bit about your background — you have both formal backgrounds in fashion and art, but did you ever think of combining those two when you were first setting out in your career, or was that a later epiphany?

I started painting and sketching at three years old. Since first grade, I also meticulously picked my outfits and was considered odd by my peers. Fashion and art started to merge in my mind during high school and solidified once I was immersed at the Parsons school. During my Junior year, an experimental knitwear course at Central Saint Martins opened my eyes to the ultra-modern, untraditional methods and artistic techniques I could incorporate into a textile. The two fully combined at that point.

Your designs display an appreciation for the avant-garde and the offbeat — who are some avant-garde artists that inspire you?

Iris Van Herpen, Caroline Hu, Gaetano Pesce, Shona Heath, and Inka Essenhigh.

Another aspect of creating something unexpected is drawing inspiration from unconventional places. Aside from other artists, what are the most abstract places or concepts you draw inspiration from for your work?

I am always moved by nature: warped branches, vines, the fungus on the north side of the tree — how it might look in a futuristic setting. I also am drawn to the art of food plating. Chef’s Table and Grant Achatz’s artistic dishes. I pull inspiration from plating arrangements, unique color palettes, and overall food presentation.

Your pieces are super fantastical and conjure imagery of folk tales or ancient god-like beings. What god, goddess, or fairy tale character do you think would most suit your designs?

Fantasia 2000’s Firebird. Every time I watch that scene, I think of my pieces appearing. I really love the concept behind the imaginative plant-fairy, brought to life by an elk breathing on her. The relationship with nature and living beings is what renews the firebird and in turn, everything she touches becomes alive and a sea of flowers bloom. I also love the color palette of this scene.

What first sparked your interest in experimenting with non-traditional materials, such as Bio-plastics and can you describe what the process of making your own materials is like?

I remember feeling limited to a handful of stores to buy fabric for projects I was working on in school. I wanted to be able to paint or sculpt a material from scratch. One of my first trials was spilling acrylic paint pouring medium onto the ground. When it dried, I was able to peel it and drape it like a piece of fabric. This was the beginning of me creating textiles from scratch. One of my professors asked if I’d heard of Bio-plastics — which I hadn’t. I began researching and within a few weeks, fashioned a few recipes that started to work. It’s a constant exercise and adventure. I cook most of the components on my household stove and generate some of my own pigments. I try to use all-natural ingredients. I’ll heat a mixture and sculpt it into the desired shape which will harden with time, adjusting ratios to strengthen or weaken the material. It is a continuous experiment.

As most of your materials are completely conceptualized and executed by you, I’m sure you’ve experimented often. What are some of the most unique resources you have utilized?

I outsource with others who work with metal, wood, lighting parts, etc. I have extensive material libraries to inspire collaboration. I’ve formed a relationship with a local furniture thrift shop, using pieces to repurpose and visualize them into larger sculptures. Most ingredients I use are utilized by other artists so I would say my most unique resource are my parents. My mom listened to my new ideas as well as provided large boxes and bags on hand for me to pack orders. My dad drives me to events, domestic deliveries, and last-minute meetings. The stability they have always provided frees my mind to take risks.

To me, your inventive pieces signal the future of fashion. You produce clothing, or even wearable art, that is meant to strike conversations and ideologies rather than just being worn for aesthetic purposes. What does the future of fashion look like to you?

Fashion now has a library of new innovative materials. From repurposed clothing to garments you can throw in the recycling at the end of the day. I believe we will be able to generate and create clothing with common appliances sold for the home. Some of us can make unique and artistic pieces to counter this. I imagine the future to be characterized by a tension between mass production and unique artistic expression.

You recently collaborated with Elena Velez for a series of bio-material, “wet” dresses. Do you see more collaborations in your future and if so, how will you select creators to work with who align with your own values?

I am constantly reaching out to collaborate. I would rather share billing with other designers and learn something new than stand alone and be static. I am drawn to unique and colorful creators and work with almost anyone at any level. But I select more carefully for repeat alliances based on how kind the artist is.

Your wearable pieces drape the wearer in an elegant way, so as to frame the body as a work of art in itself. Why do you believe it is important to emphasize fashion as an artistic medium, rather than a product of commodification?

Our world increasingly has less personal, creative expression with the rise of AI and automation. Corporations merge and fewer clothing options are mass-produced. Perhaps people can feel sentimental or something palpable about what they can wear. Perhaps they can feel like a unique sculpture themselves, unconstrained by traditional definitions of what beauty should be.

In your wildest dreams, what does your namesake brand grow and evolve to be in 10 years' time?

In 10 years, I imagine my pieces to be 100 times the size. I hope to be a woman who can be a good mother and simultaneously manage a successful career. An international exhibition to my left and another little “namesake” clutching my leg on the right. In 10 years, I hope to still be as excited and willing to learn about ways to evolve my materials!

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After 30 years and over 100 cult fragrances, COMME DES GARÇONS PARFUMS 1994–2025 BY SIMONETT & BAER launches this month

December 17, 2024

“I have to add that the topic is, of course, an irrational one, because it's not art and it's not fashion. It has to do with scent, which is something in the air,” explains Dino Simonett, renowned art-book maker and designer/publisher of the new COMME des GARÇONS x SIMONETT & BAER book, which details 30 years of CDG perfumes.

“The moment you smell something is irrational,” he continues. “This book transports you and brings you to the idea behind the perfumes. People have gotten thousands of art catalogues from me, but this fucking perfume thing really drives people a little bit crazy, you know? Because everybody has this bottle; and that bottle smells like this on them; and this bottle I need; and all the memories and everything. I like it a lot that we made this.”

As fans and family of the world’s coolest brand prepared to gather at Dover Street Parfums Market in Paris to celebrate the launch of the book, our Editor-At-Large Paige Silveria shared some coffee and cigarettes with Simonett to discuss his wild trajectory, making books with Joseph Beuys and Tilda Swinton early on, and the importance of nonconformal thinking.

By Paige Silveria

This fucking perfume thing really drives people a little bit crazy.

Paige Silveria: Tell me about yourself. You make books.

Dino Simonett: My books are my art. Each book might be a painting or sculpture. And you should not do the same sculpture all the time. When you hike somewhere, you never should go the same way back home — this is something my mother taught me when I was young. In the same way, it's boring to make the same stuff all the time. So I try to find a way to invent my own language.

PS: This book you’ve made is really beautiful.

DS: It’s hyperrealistic larger-than-life images of boxes and flacons in an endless row presented on paper the thickness of a children’s book.

PS: I loved how it said in the press release that you woke up one Sunday morning and the idea for the book suddenly came to you.

DS: The backstory is that Remo Hallauer [COO of COMME des GARÇONS International] is a true book lover. We met at the Offprint book fair in Paris. And one day, shortly after peak COVID, this email came from him asking if I’d think about a possible collaboration with one of the young stars here — and no hard feelings, but it didn’t work out. So then, as it is in life, which is the essential thing, you have to have an idea. And most of the time, they’re not good enough. You have to have another and another and then you go, Ah ha! Perfume.

PS: And you’d already been pretty familiar with their fragrances?

DS: I’ve known this stuff since the beginning. I wore the first perfume they created. It was part of my life all the time, and I thought, It's so funny. There’s a connection with how I make the books: like two, three books a year, all collaborations and each is different. Just like their perfumes. So I immediately texted Remo.

PS: And what perfect timing, with the 30-year anniversary.

DS: Yes, but this was two years ago or so. I hadn’t had the jubilee in mind. It might not look like much, but there was a lot of work to do.

PS: Many of the advertisements and images weren’t archived, physically or digitally, right? You had to search all over for a good portion of the material?

DS: Well we also had to wait for the official deal to go through in the beginning. Adrian Joffe [President of COMME des GARÇONS International and Dover Street Market International] wanted to do it but he didn’t have the mind space at the time; they were about to open the Dover Street Market here in Paris. So we were on our own for a bit, developing the project from zero. We looked all over the Internet and tried to create the chronology. I had a young guy helping me. He kept reminding me to be patient and to continue to work on growing the book. The door was open, but we had to wait in front of the next room. So we took little steps to prepare ourselves. And stuff slowly worked out.

PS: And thank God for the Internet.

DS: Yes, because as you mentioned, there was no archive. We thought surely they’d have something in the basement. But no, that didn’t exist. At one point they sent us a list of all the perfumes so we had a clear checklist to manage. I had to become an expert.

PS: There are so many, over 100?

DS: Yeah, and at one point the CDG team was activated. It was like a machine and in the spring suddenly a load of stuff was coming. First we had to grow the grapes, then make the wine and then the grappa. And at the end, it's a really strong grappa. And so things came together, and then one day Adrian said, “All is fine, but Rei [Kawakubo] must now also approve it. This is how the system works.” But nobody had told me! So Remo met with Rei to show her the book.

PS: That’s a bit of pressure!

DS: She could have said no and we’d have to throw everything in the garbage, two years of work. There was indeed a little bit of pressure. But it was fine. She liked the book. Then at the end of this summer we met again and they asked if they could have some of the finished copies on 20 November in Tokyo. I said, “I’m sorry, what?” He was thinking that the book was finished, you know? I told him we still needed a lot of material to finish it. Sometimes it's nice though to have this pressure. It's motivating and thrilling when you finally accomplish it all.

PS: Let’s go back. How did your upbringing inform who you are?

DS: It has to do with nonconformal thinking. Most people think the same. And we’re constantly pressured as well, by everything around us to conform. You have to really fight to keep your head and so I had this upbringing with this rather eccentric mother who was absolutely nonconformistic in every way. She was resolute. Why should we follow the path of the masses? It was never my thing. Voilà.

PS: How were you in school?

DS: I was not so good at school. I was only skateboarding at that time. I was on the Swiss National Team. I even was here in Paris at a European championship when I was 15 at the Trocadero. And my mother said, “You are not going to school anymore. You need an apprenticeship. It makes no sense to send you to school any longer.” I was independent and had my first salary at 16.

PS: What were you doing?

DS: I was a carpenter making tables, chairs, all that stuff. All my friends went to high school with like 16-week holidays, while I had only four. And so it was really, really tough shit for a 16 year old. But I learned two important things. The first one was discipline; seven o'clock each day it started and lasted nine hours. And the second thing was precision; you have to do things right. People always said to me that the apprenticeship was good as I’d really use it for the rest of my life. And I always thought that was such bullshit. But actually, it's kind of true. And so anyways, the moment I finished my apprenticeship, the very last day of the last test, I went on the Interrail for one month and never went back to a carpenter shop.

PS: What’d you do after?

DS: I wrote a letter to this very super famous music guy, Claude Nobs who was organizing the Montreux Jazz Festival in Switzerland, telling him I’d like to work there that summer. I mentioned that I’d just finished my apprenticeship for carpentry. He phoned me back immediately after getting the letter. He said, “Oh you’re a carpenter? You can come right now.” He was renovating his apartment in Montreux. So I stayed and worked there alone while he was up at his chalet. I felt like Kevin McCallister from Home Alone in this completely furnished apartment. And then the festival started, and there was this guy from New York doing a large mural painting. It was Keith Haring. I had no idea who he was. We became friends. Then I met George Benson and Herbie Hancock. It started from nothing and then one thing comes, another thing comes, another thing comes. This is how I started, which is maybe not the natural way. But I was following my intuition and taking chances and putting myself out there.

PS: And you're going after what you have a passion for.

DS: I think that’s the best way to live one's life. It was like my own private art school. I met all the guys I was totally hot about. I met Joseph Beuys and told him I wanted to do an art project with him. I got his number and he told me to ask for his assistant. But I took everything for granted, what people said to me. So I had this phone number in Berlin. And I called the guy 20 times until this fucking meeting with Beuys finally happened. And we met and made a small collaboration art magazine called “Quer.” You just have to stick to the stuff.

PS: Wow. You don't still have one of those copies around, do you?

DS: I had one and I brought it to Remo at one of our meetings. Adrian saw it and immediately took it … I hope he gave it back to Remo. Adrian has a pile of my stuff that he wanted to see, so that’s good.

PS: Yeah, of any coffee table in the world for it to be displayed, his is probably in the top 10.

DS: So then I decided my dream was to be a film director. There was a film school in Berlin that I applied to. They only took about 18 people from 600. We waited all week to see this list on the wall for the final call back meeting. And my name wasn’t there. I was like, “Shit!” And then a week later, I received a letter saying I’d been accepted. Later the director told me it was clear enough with my application and the art magazine I’d sent that I’d be accepted. I don’t say this to brag. I say this to tell you that every young person that wants to go somewhere, all they have to do is fight. You have to get out of your house and your small town and your comfort zone and all that shit.

PS: I agree. So you’ve made films?

DS: I made a feature movie and went to the film festival. It was really amazing and everything, but I was not Tarantino, you know? So it’s the last semester and Tilda Swinton is supposed to teach a seminar. I really wanted to attend it. It would be the cherry on top of the cake. Then she postponed it once, then twice. The third time, I’m on the tube and there’s a woman in front of me with a newspaper that says that Tilda’s super mentor, Derek Jarman, had passed away. It’s the very Monday morning that her seminar is set to begin. And I thought, Oh shit. She’s not going to be there. But then she was there after all and it was a fantastic week. There were only five of us students and we all fell in love with her. And she fell in love with us. I’ve known her since.

PS: I can only imagine. How’d you make the transition into books?

DS: You have to find out what you're really good at. I had long discussions with this guru, an old guy who was a very diligent, very bright guy. I was really miserable, feeling directionless. He asked me why I wasn’t continuing with filmmaking. And I couldn't give him an answer. Then he said right into my face, “Probably it’s because you’re not good enough.” The message was one-hundred percent received. It was a relief; I'm not a bad person. This guy told me the truth, and I could accept it. And when you can do this, you can figure out what you actually want to do, what you’re actually good at. I started making books. I made one with another film director. And we visited Tilda at her hotel, bringing one to her as a present. As we’re knocking, I thought to myself, If I did another book focused on people in this business, it’d have to be her. And she opens the door, looks at the book and says, “Oh, I would like to have a book like this on me.”

PS: These situations seem unreal.

DS: I spent five years on her book, which was an enormous success. It included stills from all her films and launched it in different cities. Fantastic shit.

PS: And now you’ve just released this soon-to-be iconic CDG book.

DS: I've learned to be patient; things can take you years. This book with Adrian and Remo took two years and I didn’t even know if it was going to be approved! Follow your dreams as much as you can. It's not so important which dream it is exactly. If I see a step in front of me, I try to take each chance I get. This is what I wish for everybody, in whatever situation you find yourself, start to do something with nothing. This book started with just a simple idea. You can not find anything like this on the Internet, this compilation, this narrative. It’s something we had to bring together with enormous work. And here we are. I think in our digital, splattered times sometimes you have to make something which is real. That you can sit with and focus on in silence and really take time alone with it.