Fashion(ing) Artifacts | Curatorial Notes
Spring 2026
For several decades, I have been collecting, fashioning, and preserving clay, cloth, and textile materials. I think of these pieces as artifacts, as they embody cultural and historical threads, intricately entwined with personal narratives and craftsmanship.
This studio collection references fashion concepts and intuitive aspects of making or remaking. In some instances, this process encourages me to step back and let an artifact or grouping of artifacts exist as is.
Select forms sit in dialogue with one another, allowing the surrounding space to develop its own resonance and topography. By pairing artifacts with texts from my studio library, these forms take on new life when viewed through the lens of a written passage or a book’s layout.
Choosing to fashion in a way that slows the process and explores new relationships with materials holds real, enduring value. Multi-dimensional fashioning might weave in bold perspectives, minimal interventions, and critical thinking. Over time, a certain patina might also emerge without too much polishing or finesse.
Our environs hold or present things in ways that might encourage openness and mutability. Thinking about materials in this broader context shapes how I view my own fashion(ing) sensibility. It welcomes poetic emptiness, deeper space, and, at times, greater curiosity about what is intrinsically fitting.
– A.D.
Fashion(ing) AD | about:
An evolving craft/design/materials preservation project by Abigail Doan Studio. Abigail’s fashion(ing) research and editorials/interviews have appeared in the following publications:
[ print ]
Amica (Bulgaria)
Marie Claire (South Africa)
Hand/Eye Magazine
Slow Stitch: Mindful and Contemplative Textile Art
Surface Design Magazine
The Wild Magazine
[ digital ]
Alabama Chanin Journal
Business Review
EcoFashion Talk
Ecouterre/Inhabitat
Design & Culture by Ed
Dwell
FIT Journal
Moowon
Nomad Chic
Prairie Journal
Plural Magazine
Selvedge Magazine
Slow Fashion Next
Social Alterations
The Uniform Project
Trendtablet
Voz Stories
Curatorial Exhibition Projects/Coursework:
Sedimental Edition 01 for Lost in Fiber Library
Walking Libraries, Oblong @ Design Go, Romanian Design Week, Bucharest, Romania
Curatorial advisor/researcher/writer, Masquerade exhibition with Kraftmade, Cincu, Romania
Curatorial advisor/researcher/writer, Carnivalesque exhibition with Kraftmade, Cincu, Romania
Biomimicry design coursework and study certification with Learn Biomimicry
Fashion Values: Nature and Fashion Values: Culture coursework with the Centre for Sustainable Fashion, London College of Fashion
Walking Libraries / presented in the U.S. and Europe, featured by Moowon (2016 to 2022)
KraftMaking the Future: Fibers and Foraging Heritage in Transylvania / materials contributor (2018)
Earthtones L.A. / co-curator for Poketo Project Space at Row DTLA (2018)
Tumbleweed Colony/curator and installation for NYC x Design (2015)
Fashion Revolution Day/country coordinator for Bulgaria (2014)
Art of Slow Fashion/presenter for Ethical Fashion Academy (2013)
Fete for the Senses/curator and installation (featured by Trendtablet, 2012)
Fashion(ing) Self and the Environment/lecturer at the Fashion Institute of Technology (2011)
Fashion(ing) Self and the Environment/presenter for the Textile Arts Center in Brooklyn (2011)
Flotsam Fiber Forms / recycled materials installation for Vogue Knitting Live (2011)
EcoChic Geneva in conjunction with the United Nations/advisor for designer selections (2010)
(Re)Fashioning Fiber: New Horizons in Environmental Art and Fashion/curator and materials exhibitor (2010)
Fearless Dreaming, House of Organic, New York, New York / co-curator with Meiling Chen (2009)
Urban Fiber Flotsam, site-specific presentation for Conflux Art / Center for Architecture (2008)