Tim Walker

Tim Walker, has made his name through his gloriously decadent fashion story fantasies. His shoots are lavish stage shows that draw reference from children’s stories, fairy tales and ideas of English heritage. His current exhibition at the Design Museum is a curious insight into his working methods; from the first stages of his research and sketchbooks to the polaroids and contact sheets from the shoots (yes, he apparently still works on film), to the giant props littered throughout the show to the impressive finished prints.

Walkers images play with the unattainable elements of fashion couture- the sheer extravagance of the clothes for many being something of daydreams-unreachable, bringing out childlike fantasies of dressing up boxes, of fairytales.  His images juxtapose everything from the absurd to the sublime, doing so in a refined and suberbly beautiful manner.  Saccharine hues blear through windows of English mansions, models walk out of the pages of magazines, snow floods through open windows coating heritage homes in a blinding whiteness, cascading dresses fall down staircases.  One image is set in a palatial drawing room that has been shaken by an earthquake; paint peels from the walls, the ceiling is splintering and Lily Cole protrudes from peacock feathers that are embellishing the walls.  The images are rich in their references as their are in their imagination, taking cues from Beaton and Parkinson as he nods to art, literature, and fashion photography itself (see models in boxes made to look like manufactured dolls, models literally walking out of the pages of Vogue).

The show is on until 28th September, go and get lost in Walker's world...