Fashion designer Vika Im first caught our attention with her powerful collection Genderosity at Designers» Nest last year. The collection was a token of Vika Im’s considerable craftsmanship, as well as her erupting, fertile creativity. Since then, we have seen her awe-inspiring creations pop up here and there, worn by power women such as OhLand, Lina Ravn and Rimon, in addition to Vika Im garments being featured in Schön Magazine, Office Magazine and VOGUE Italia!

We were eager to learn more about this creative brainiac, so we had a little chat with her, where she generously let us in on some of her thoughts regarding fashion, creativity, sustainability and gender.

Who is the person behind Vika Im?

I am a multinational, multicultural and multidisciplinary persona with an insane background and crazy life experience. Moreover, I would say that I exhibit slightly schizophrenic behaviour and psychopathic thinking. I am more than you think…

What is the foundation of Vika Im? 

My main interest has always been art, but fashion allowed me to execute art in a more practical way. So I began making wearable art.

Tell us more about your collection Genderosity, which you showcased at Designers» Nest in 2019. How does it relate to femininity?

I have always been interested in social behaviours from a scientific point of view. Being a fashion designer is not always considered as something serious, so I took the responsibility to change the view. I felt that this project was the perfect chance for me to demonstrate how femininity is underrated. For me, it is important to be approachable and understandable in whatever message you are conveying. I feel that fashion can do that.

“I think that in order to be strong, women (or anyone) don’t have to be masculine. Instead, they should use and embrace the power of femininity.”

— Vika Im

In your opinion, what is the role of fashion when it comes to gender equality? 

I think fashion always has, and always will play a huge role in gender equality. Just think about all the transgender people, who were able to embrace themselves through the magic of fashion, as well as all the females, who were able to accentuate their power by the means of male dress code. I want to re-evaluate the current view on design and how it can be based on gender, which in turn I believe could promote a change in gendered behaviour, stereotypes and cultural norms. I believe fashion can save lives, if used wisely.

Vika’s key source of inspiration is the self-perceived history of her family, as well as her personal narrative and emotional life. She describes her background as being a collection of crazy and diverse experiences, where she and her family have gone through and overcome adverse circumstances. In her designs, she often incorporates those encounters from the past with some global issues of the present. In particular, social messages are very important to her, and she feels that fashion is a powerful tool which has the potential to promote change for the better. Vika Im often translates modern social struggles from her own life into abstract and extreme garments. In a way, she conveys her artistic and political message through her unique visual philosophy, which some might consider abstract, sarcastic or even crude.

What is creativity to you?

To me, fashion design is a creative journey based on the ability to find ideas and generate expressions out of almost anything, then incarnating those into their maximum visual potential, where they are turned into a source of further inspiration to myself and others. All of this, in order to create something wearable, intelligent or simply useful.

Anyone you’ve always wanted to dress? 

I want to dress the ultimate fashion skeptic.

What’s your favorite part of running Vika Im?

To be able to do what I want to do. At the moment, I’m mainly concentrating on other things than my own brand though, but I will never stop building on it and I shall continue to work on establishing a good reputation in the long term. This has made my expectations calm down a little bit, which actually makes things much easier and more enjoyable.

Since Vika graduated with a master’s degree in Fashion Design from KADK in 2018, she has worked as a designer for Han Kjøbenhavn. Besides working there full-time, she also does a lot of non-profit passion projects on the side, where she contributes to creative collaborations with different artists and stylists from around the world.

Any major breakthroughs along the way? 

I still stick to my own way of developing and executing concepts and products. 

“My favourite part of the design process is to discover something unexpected which most of the time is much more exciting than the original idea.”

— Vika Im

What does it mean to you to be a designer in these times? 

Being creative as a designer doesn’t cut it anymore – if you are to meet the demands of today, you also need to be innovative. We are scientists, so to speak! It’s our role to create intelligent products that could potentially save humanity or at least change it for the better. The impact we could have as designers and innovators can change lives.

What is sustainability in fashion to you?

For me sustainability is more than just «organic cotton,» it’s about the whole chain of production – from when a seed starts to grow in soil, all the way to when a finished product is ready on a hanger, along with every part of the process in between. I feel that it’s important to be transparent about the production process, meanwhile sure to keep a strong balance between creativity and commerciality.