Eva Gronbach

Eva Gronbach (* 1971 in Cologne ) is a German fashion designer .

Life and work

education

Eva Gronbach grew up in the Rhineland between Cologne and Bonn. After twelve years of Waldorf school, she graduated from high school. She then completed an apprenticeship as a dressmaker at the Elly-Heuss-Knapp School in Düsseldorf. In the following years she studied at the Institut supérieur des arts visuels La Cambre in Brussels and in 2000 received her diploma in “Stylisme et Création de la Mode”. During an exchange year at the Institut Français de la Mode in Paris, she previously completed her Master of Arts. Gronbach lives in Berlin.

Engagements and commissioned work

Alongside his studies, Gronbach worked for Stephen Jones, Yohji Yamamoto , John Galliano and Hermès, among others . For the 2006 soccer World Cup, she produced the official fan shirt on behalf of Germany - Land of Ideas , the joint initiative of the German government and German industry, represented by the Federation of German Industries (BDI). She also designed a shoe collection for the sports shoe manufacturer Möbus. In 2008, the Federal Agency for Civic Education engaged Gronbach as part of the ECHT! - Politics in free theater for the design of accessories. In the same year, the fashion designer was commissioned to design the uniform for the European express train Thalys . In 2013, in cooperation with Köln Tourismus, she designed the so-called KölnShirt, which is made from organic cotton and shows the Cologne Cathedral at dusk as a motif. She also designed uniforms again, this time for the international hotel chain Novotel . In 2018 Eva Gronbach founded the first professional association for fashion designers in Germany: German Fashion Designers Federation eV She is the chairwoman of GFDF eV

Own labels and collections

With their mostly simple collections and clear formal language, Gronbach deals with current political and social issues such as national identity, femininity and sustainability. Her fashion provokes and stimulates discussion. It is sold in Europe, Asia and the USA.

Gronbach founded the labels "Eva Gronbach" and "german jeans". "Eva Gronbach" is characterized by clear shapes and simple elegance. "German jeans" is a basic collection for men and women. She is inspired by the work of the miners in coal mining. The garments are made from used miner's suits and have a gray-beige color and clear signs of wear. Eva Gronbach's trademark is a stylized eagle, which is visibly printed along with her name in the form of a stamp on many items in the collections.

With her collection “Déclaration d'amour à l'Allemagne” (“Declaration of love to Germany”), Gronbach attracted international attention in 2000. Their motifs of the stylized federal eagle, black, red and gold and the capital D attracted attention and controversy.

Exhibitions and fashion shows

The designer's work is shown nationally and internationally. They can be seen in museums, at fashion weeks, exhibitions and in public institutions. Gronbach also works as a curator.

As a guest curator, she presented pieces by fashion designers in the exhibition “In. Femme Fashion - 1780–2004 ”in the Museum of Applied Arts Cologne . The focus was on the modeling of femininity through the ages. A year later, the museum bought parts from Gronbach's collection.

In 2004 the fashion designer presented her work at the Goethe Institute in Berlin. In 2005 she worked as a curator for the Stadtmuseum Düsseldorf . For the exhibition “Generation Mode” she visited fifty fashion schools in over thirty countries. Stops on her journey were u. a. Tokyo, Paris and London, but also Ulan Bator, Cape Town, Dakar, Auckland, Shanghai, Reykjavík, Kingston in Jamaica, Caracas and Tashkent in Uzbekistan.

From 2008 to 2010 the designer ran the eva gronbach store in the Belgian Quarter in Cologne. In cooperation with the Belgian House of Cologne, Brussels fashion designers presented their collections there for several weeks exclusively on the German market. With this action, Gronbach sought to deepen relations between Brussels and Cologne, Belgium and Germany.

Unique pieces from Gronbach's collections were acquired by the House of History of the Federal Republic of Germany in Bonn and can be seen there in the permanent exhibition. In addition, the LWL-Industriemuseum acquired parts of the “german jeans” collection. In 2011 the Jewish Museum Berlin invited the designer to show her work from the past ten years in the exhibition “how German is it?”. In 2012 Gronbach took part in the MANIFESTA 09 European Art Biennale.

In September 2015 Gronbach presented in the show "Relight - Best of Eva Gronbach" their work the past 15 years as part of the Futur25 festival, the Federal Agency for Civic Education together with the Ministry of the Interior on the occasion of the 25th anniversary of German reunification in Radialsystem V organized in Berlin.

Fashion design courses in schools and universities

Working with children and young adults distinguishes Gronbach's work. The artist initiates and teaches fashion design classes in German schools. She also appears as a speaker at congresses and in television shows, including a. in the Berlin Academy of the Arts and at the “Kinder zum Olymp!” congress, where she also organized workshops. In May 2008 she was a visiting professor at the Cologne International School of Design ( KISD ). With the topic “Transformation Process in Fashion Design” she introduces students to the topic of fashion. In 2009, Gronbach ran designer workshops for schoolchildren in the Ruhr area. The project was funded by the state of North Rhine-Westphalia. The students' designs were presented in a fashion show in 2010 as part of RUHR.2010 - European Capital of Culture . Since 2014 Gronbach has been working as a lecturer in fashion design at the International Fashion School ( ESMOD ) in Berlin.

Eva Gronbach has been committed to fashion as an object of cultural education in schools since 2008.

In cooperation with the Federal Agency for Civic Education Eva Gronbach developed the fashion-conscious project. Here she works with school classes. It enables children and young people to take an artistic and creative approach to the question "Who am I? Where do I come from? Where do I go? Besides, do I belong?"

Awards

In 2004 Gronbach received the T-Com Inspire Award for her collection “Déclaration d'amour à l'Allemagne” (“Declaration of love to Germany”).

In 2010, Gronbach won third place in the men's fashion category at the first German Fashion Film Award Berlin.

Collections (excerpt)

• 2000/01: "Déclaration d'amour à l'Allemagne" - fashionable declaration of love to Germany. The aim of the designer was to develop a positive feeling towards Germany without appearing patriotic or even nationalistic. She used the German national colors rather inconspicuously.
• 2002: "Declaration of love for Germany" - The elegant fashion is mainly black and white and has subtle applications in the German national colors.
• 2003: “ mother earth father land ” - pullovers and jackets sometimes have appliqués with heavily alienated eagle wings. The German national colors are used offensively. Some pieces have an imprint such as B. “Home is home”, “black red gold” or “mother earth father land”. Most of the models have their roots in Asia and Africa.
• 2004/2005: "my new police dress uniform" - comfortable leisure look in dark blue. Here Eva Gronbach worked again with the eagle as a symbol and the German national colors. The magazine DEUTSCH publishes a photo series on this.
• Autumn / Winter 2005/06: " myfile - my profile " - fashion as a commitment to self. Cooperation with Bayer MaterialScience . The collection should express transparency, openness and peacefulness. Gronbach used Technogel, a gel-like, transparent material that is being used in fashion for the first time. Classic items of clothing made from high-quality black wool fabrics were provided with cast gel elements.
• 2006: “Fandress” for the World Cup in Germany “I AM A FAN OF YOU”, commissioned by Germany - Land of Ideas .
• Summer 2006: "Glück auf" - She made casual and street clothes out of her friends' work clothes. The hard, scratchy cotton fabric became soft and cuddly through repeated boiling. Although the superficial dirt can be removed, the oil stains, holes and the personnel numbers of the former miners can still be seen.
• Autumn / Winter 2006/07: "the sacrosanct" (German: sacred, inviolable) - the topic of global disregard for human rights is taken up. Jackets and shirts were z. B. with the silhouette of a huddled prisoner and with a text of human rights. Some of the clothing was the same orange color as the prison clothing from the prison camp at Guantanamo Bay Naval Base .
• Spring / Summer 2007: The simple and elegant collection was dedicated to the artist Karl Valentin (1882–1948).
• 2008: Uniform collection for the employees of the European high-speed train Thalys .
• 2013 Design of the new uniforms for the international hotel chain Novotel .
• 2014–2015 lecturer in fashion design at Esmod - Int. Art Academy for Fashion Berlin.
• 2015 Order of the federal government for 25 years of German unity "Declaration of love in Germany"
• 2015–2016 Dru Yoga teacher training Wales UK DruYoga.
• 2016 Workshop Fashion & Fair Trade Art and Knowledge Camp SAVE THE WORLD / YOUNG PLANET Theater Bonn.
• 2016–2017 teaching position in the field of marketing in the state bachelor's degree at the EC Europa Campus Hochschule in Frankfurt, Mannheim and Karlsruhe.
• 2017–2019 Strategy and Cross-Media Communication Friends of Waldorf Education.
• 2018 teacher training course on fashion design in Dillingen, Bavaria.

The Academy for Teacher Training and Personnel Management in Dillingen, Bavaria, commissioned Eva Gronbach to organize a teacher training course on the subject of fashion design for the first time.

• 2018 Founding of the German Fashion Designers Federation eV Chairwoman of the GFDF eV board

literature

• Patricia Brattig (Ed.): Exhibition catalog , In: femme fashion 1780–2004: Modeling the feminine in fashion , Arnoldsche Verlagsanstalt, Stuttgart 2003, ISBN 3-89790-215-X .
• Eva Gronbach and Susanne Anna: Generation Mode (the Fashion Generation) , Hatje Cantz Verlag, Ostfildern 2005, ISBN 3-7757-1614-9 .

Web links

• Eva Gronbach's website
• Eva Gronbach in an interview with "Fashion @ Society"