‘Style is your signature. Fashion is ever changing’. Malaysian designer charts her own course
- Cassey Gan crafts distinctive pieces for her eponymous collections that look like patchwork collages, and are meant to be worn in layers
- Playful, full of colour and inspired by art, her original prints are a hit in Malaysia and Singapore, and international fashion buyers are watching her label
In a single Cassey Gan design, multiple pieces of fabric are pieced together like collages, exposed buckles and straps showing. When she presented her latest collection at London Fashion Week in February, her models showed the colourful, printed layers of Gan’s signature style – dresses layered over tops, tops over dresses, a riot of pattern and texture.
“I feel a resonance with London because it’s known for an individualistic style of dress,” says Gan. “Depending on how you layer my clothes, it can have that individualism.”
This year was the second year the Malaysian designer had presented a collection in London, the city where she learned fashion. Gan is a graduate of London College of Fashion, where she took a fashion design and technology course.
It was the start of a serendipitous career, and one she had not foreseen. Gan initially studied chemical engineering; it was only after graduating that she realised she was on the wrong path. When she got a job at a women’s magazine, she started to explore clothes.
“I was interested in crafts from a young age, working with my hands, but not necessarily fashion fashion,” she says. “During my job at the magazine, I grew curious about how clothes are made. I was flipping them inside out, to see.”