Františka Blažková

Fling open the whimsical gates of Polka Dot Town! The black-and-white yet colourful collection by designer Noémi Špontáková is awash in layers of dots of various diameters and placements, resulting in a lovely tingling sensory chaos for the viewers. Noémi describes her individual looks as a set of collectables, each chosen and styled with a specific model in mind.

Honeylambs Mission is back! Our previous feature on Ernesto Stewart and his singular project became SWARM Mag's historically most viewed article. We caught up with the artist two years later to learn what's new in his sanctuary for disfigured and mutated plushies, inhabited by the souls of the deceased.

“I strive to celebrate cultural diversity in a world quick to discriminate.” Currently Paris-based fashion, textile and knitwear designer Sofia Castellon presents her candy-hued but confronting and space-claiming sculptural visions. Sofia talked to Swarm about finding her creative path, “navigating the complexities of cultural identity”, why is knitting and incredible medium for storytelling and why the designer envisions a fruitful future for one of the world's oldest thread crafts, and more.

“Every job throws you into a vortex of the unexpected.” Prague-based creative photography duo SHOTBY.US introduces a new photo series called “Sips”. Featuring vibrant colours, abstract amoebic shapes and bits of sweets, the pictures feel like examining specimen samples from a psychedelic pond under a microscope.

At first glance, Natálie Nepovímová's looks seem simplistic and stripped to the bone. The second glance, though, reveals sartorial mastery and clever structural and textural twists. Imbued with a touch of whimsy, these “working girl” variable and adjustable designs were created to not succumb to time.

Larissa Honsek is a creative director, 3D and clay artist, and author of the most adorable characters for kids and adults alike. In the interview with the creator below, we discuss how she keeps on being artistically amazed by her little daughter's “fresh brain”, her deep love of Berlin or how her multi-media style painstakingly emerged.

“We have watched many clubs and festivals opening in the Czech Republic and many fitness centres opening in Slovakia.” Nowadays, the Pohoda Festival near Trenčín, Slovakia, is an internationally acclaimed award-winning three-day event but its seeds were sown by the Slovak hardcore scene nearly three decades ago. Michal Kaščák, Pohoda’s original founding father, explains this growth, the deeply rooted activist side of the event, and how the festival has been championing an above-standard ethical, ecological and diversity framework since the first edition.

“It's impossible to get bored with ceramics.” Markéta Špundová is a Czech ceramics designer whose whimsical and delightfuly chaotic body of work overflows with cheeky humour and unexpected references. With the artist, we talked the malleable and mirroring nature of ceramics, balancing practicality and storytelling, jolting awake with sour candy, and more.

London-based fashion designer Tanya Liu's intricate creations could be simply pigeonholed as ultimate mermaidcore – but they spring from much deeper sources. The pearlescent gradients and gently billowing silhouettes are rooted in the relationship between natural biology and post-human science, and mechanisms of endless life cycles of certain species. In the interview, we talk the bell of the immortal jellyfish, pivotal influences, and the scent of lavender.

Don't let the cheery colours fool you, the whimsical world of Latvian illustrator and object maker Inga Ziemele is chock-full of adorable danger and seedy characters. In the interview, Inga talks using art to work through the themes of self-acceptance and anxiety, bringing joy into people's lives, and professes her love for deceitfully cute bunnies.

Chelsea Theilmann's vibrant tufted floral creations came about as a pandemic lockdown project and soon turned into a hallmark of her artistic practice, desired by many. Her joyful creations are intended to brighten up spaces and moods either as rugs or wall decor and some can be even worn as handbags. More in the interview below.

“In video games, nothing interested me more than character creation.” Since Polish fashion designer Maja Bączyńska founded her eponymous label, she's been gracing the world with her sometimes sleek, most of the time maximal and opulent silhouettes. In the interview, Bączyńska sheds light on her playful pieces featuring frilly and sculptural textures, unexpected twists and reference layers, and clever and uncompromising tailoring.

We've emerged from the thawed soil and we crave quick energy. Sweetness so frustrating you'll want to spit it out. By launching our first theme for the 2024 season, SUGAR RUSH, we wish to replenish your tired brains with fast carbs and worry about balanced diets later. The theme's cover was crafted by the talented Czech illustrator and graphic designer Danchez.

“In general, people stay much longer at raves than in a gallery.” The Slovak creative duo behind AUSGANG Studio, Alex Zelina and Radovan Dranga, craft menacing and sometimes unsettling sculptures and mobile installations from materials typically considered waste with an occasional AI crossover. You can run into these in a gallery or, unexpectedly, at a dim dancefloor.

“The feeling of having enough time, the luxury of boredom, is very important to me when making art,” quips Bronislava Orlická, the idiosyncratic Czech painter and tattoo artist, whose iconic gradient “flames” adorn countless limbs and torsos across the world. The scope of her artistic practice is broad: from the aforementioned tattoos to large-scale paintings to machine knitting. Get to know her below.

Beca Alcorta is a Berlin-based self-taught sculptural artist with a MA in Psychology, infusing her pearlescent, corals-like creations with what she knows about the human psyche and gothic aesthetic influences. In the exclusive interview, we delve into joy of working with randomness, adaptive and maladaptive illusions, never-before-felt hopelessness, and more.

“I believe that I can open the closed doors of your soul.” Polina Revunenko, Ukrainian metalsmith and designer, unveiled a sliver of her magical inner realm for us in an interview. In her jewellery collections, she uses a special casting technique, which makes the resulting jewellery appear molten and crudely wrought, reminiscent of some sort of mediaeval or druidic cult insignia.

“Complexity isn’t always necessary for impactful design.” Being a Swiss citizen of Vietnamese descent, Duc Siegenthaler has been navigating the ebb and flow of blending in and standing out since childhood. SWARM Mag interviewed the founder and Creative Director of the Siegenthaler label about avoiding reducing modularity to “a gimmick”, constant self-discovery, indulging in play, and more.

Mossy, mouldy, earthy – all these adjectives give you a very rough outline of the garments the Copenhagen-based Solitude Studios craft and sometimes even grow and ferment. Their A/W23 collection, Wood Wide Web, hints at the recently popularised notion of “mycorrhizal internet”, the sprawling matrix of mycelium that connects fungi and various members of the plant kingdom, ferrying nutrients and other kinds of “information”.

The goal of “bringing visions to life”, so essential and ubiquitous in the art world, is often hindered and challenged by compromises, most often on the technological and material side of things. But putting Susanna Pugliese's fantastical fashion sketches next to the near-identical final garments is a testament to her commitment to fulfil this goal no matter its labouriousness. Read on for the interview with the Italian-born fashion designer in possession of a wide range of artisanal skills.