Seeing Stars : Interview with Celinecelines from SLOWFACTORY.

We recently caught up with the up and coming Montreal based designer Celinecelines of SLOWFACTORY to talk about her inspirations and motivations concerning sharing, stars and future endeavors. Check out www.slowfactory.com to see the entire collection available for sale online.

Interview by Ashley Bilodeau for LeSmokingMTL.com

LeSmokingMTL: Can you explain to us your views on sharing and collaborating? This has been a constant theme in your career and you are always very vocal when speaking about your involvement in Creative Commons.

Celinecelines: Creative Commons is an open license decriminalizing people who decide to share or remix a certain content. It facilitates sharing / remixing and collaborating. These are the core values of the Web culture. Being web-native and having learned my craft online thanks to communities and people sharing their knowledge, I am an open culture activist and encourage people to upload / share and participate thus growing an existing culture. For Slowfactory I collaborated with Pattern Recognition's artist and founder Zohar Kfir for the first collection on NASA Hubble. Since she specializes in printing on silk fabric, I turned to her for advice and she was super excited about the project.

LeSmokingMTL: How has creative commons influenced and shaped your process as a designer?

Celinecelines: I don't know if CC has influenced me as a designer. I was already doing design, the thing that it did was make me feel part of a larger voice / initiative / community. I met amazing people while being involved with CC and it opened up my options. I started being super involved in the CC Salon (Qatar / Beirut / Montreal) and meeting more interesting people and bringing people together. I love bringing people together, interacting with people is really great!

LeSmokingMTL: What does the digital era mean to you?

Celinecelines: It means the present. It means where we are at now in our evolution. We live with digital platforms that have shaped our perspective / vision / culture. For the lucky ones, we have adjusted to change, we have opened up to other possibilities and created new crafts. For the unlucky ones, we have fought hard for things to NOT change (which is like swimming against the current and can be very exhausting). Some people are afraid because they cannot control the message anymore, or simply because they feel they cannot keep up with the movement, the information flow etc... Its a current state of change.

LeSmokingMTL: When did you start researching NASA Hubble images?

Celinecelines: Since I was a kid, I wanted to be an astronaut. I read somewhere that the majority of the eldest children in a family tend to want to be astronauts. I am part of that majority, a generation of kids who dream about the Universe, who dream to discover the unknown... I think the first contacts I added on my Flickr account where NASA Goddard's account and my favorite images are from that account. One time I twitted something like : "imagine this image printed on a silk scarf#hermes style http://www.flickr.com/photos/gsfc/6511685905/in/contacts/ …"wear the beauty of the univers" That was the point where I decided to act upon my idea.

LeSmokingMTL: Where does your mind go when looking at these images?

Celinecelines: My mind stops and admires. I think that we need more moments in life where we can safely allow our minds to take power naps so that they don't tend to freak out and spin. I believe in wisdom, peace of mind and for someone to grow and rise up to a higher self. The more the mind spins, the more we stagnate. So, yeah, I contemplate.

LeSmokingMTL: What made you want to start a collection of scarves?

Celinecelines:I love Hermés and I am a big fan of fashion and trends. Trends are defining cultures and times and its fascinating. I come from the Middle-East where wrapping yourself in scarves is very chic ;) and from Montreal where you NEED to wrap yourself in a scarf otherwise you'll freeze to death lol!

LeSmokingMTL: What do you hope to accomplish with SLOWFACTORY?

Celinecelines: I want to keep collaborating with trend setters / fashion designers. This Collection from SLOWFACTORY is a first of a series of collaborations, we are currently working closely with one of Montreal's TOP designer on a Top Secret Project (for now) :) and we will soon be very excited to share it with the world.... Stay tuned!!!