With “ABSOLUTE,” Ukrainian designer Irina Dzhus transforms trauma into a stark, sculptural language. The project began during a period when Dzhus, having fled war and survived family abuse, entered what seemed like a safe chapter that quickly unraveled. She returned to survival mode and used creation as her immediate coping mechanism. The result is a collection that carries the weight of lived experience without slipping into spectacle.
Premiered at Berlin Fashion Week and now presented at Jaga Hupało Space of Creation in Warsaw, the show replaces music with the designer’s own narration. A cube frame and a solitary chair set the tone for a work built around memory, fear, and the slippage between protection and threat.
Silhouettes draw on modernist comics and spiritualist imagery. Transformable garments replay memories in loops, while accessories made from pre owned headpieces and scarves gesture toward kintsugi and repair. Anatomical metaphors recur: stitched mouths, hybrid faces, and a coat fused with an embracing figure that haunts the wearer like a double. These motifs track Dzhus’ fixation on attachment, obsession, and the presence that shadowed her through the experience.
For the designer, “ABSOLUTE” confirmed that creativity is both her refuge and her burden. The project became a turning point, setting a new conceptual direction for DZHUS and sparking an ongoing audiovisual campaign rooted in emotional clarity and ethical design.
DZHUS is known for its transformable, cruelty free garments and engineering driven patternmaking. Since relocating to the EU at the start of the war, the brand has donated a portion of profits to animal rights groups and continues to challenge conventional ideas of gender, form, and material ethics.
Credits:
@dzhus.conceptual.wear | Direction and styling: @irina.dzhus
Location: @jaga_hupalo_space_of_creation
Photo: @juliajaracz at @konew.ka
Video: @patynowski.p
Objects: @zieta_studio @anna.drozd.tutaj @organic_lighting
Footwear: @housemartin_footwear
Models: @asia.dyrkacz @maggy_outlook @chestnoepionerskoe @lenashtyk @pearlsandashes
Cody Rooney is the Editor in Chief and senior contributor at liminul.
He is a PhD candidate, digital content specialist, writer, editor, multi-media artist, and photographer.