Enter Teema Rucksajit: a Bangkok-born designer and creative director whose self-titled label focuses on everyday essentials crafted from silks. Her work aspires to be unisex, gender-inclusive and to allow radical self-expression. It’s gorgeous, too. Teema’s pieces are made to be mixed and matched, effortlessly layered to suit the mood.
These days, the mood is Hua Hin leisure. Teema stayed with us from September 5-10 as an artist in residence—using her time at The Standard, Hua Hin to get inspired and develop her next designs. She worked with Director Jacq to ideate on a new collection, which will debut at The Standard, Hua Hin on November 4. Teema joins an illustrious line of Director Jacq’s collaborators including Jane Birkin, Alejandro Jodorowsky and Issey Miyake—quite a legacy.
It's been said that Director Jacq's work “reads like religious manuscripts of a lost or undiscovered tribal society and are composed by hand with a high level of craftsmanship and sense for geometrical harmony.” He describes himself as an outsider artist who expresses himself through hand embroidered fabrics, usually in the shape of heraldry and capes. His works are as much artwork to be hung on walls and museums as they can be worn for spiritual rituals to restore humans relationship with nature. His work is full of historical references, existing or self-invented mythology and personal memories.
The world of fashion and textile is nothing new for Teema, who was raised in a family of fashion-forward women. Teema’s grandmother was Thailand’s pioneering couturier, while her mother founded Atelier Pichita (the country’s leading silk couture house) in the 1980s. As a result, Teema spent her childhood backstage at fashion shows before earning her BFA in Fine Arts & Fashion Marketing from Parsons School of Design.
Her signature mix of authentic Thai materials, fashion heritage, design knowledge and boundary-pushing collaborations inform her next collection—and so does the vibe at The Standard, Hua Hin. We can’t wait to see what Teema dreamed up during her stay at The Standard.
