Contemporary Hungarian fashion, part 3. – DVA

According to Tropical Magazine, more and more talented designers, also capable of competing internationally, are appearing in Hungary. They are taking part in an increasing number of prominent events in Hungary presenting their implemented designs. Nini Molnár, Richárd Demeter and the DVA team are the dominant actors in the contemporary Hungarian fashion. Their designs and accessories pop up in many places, online, on the catwalk or in everyday life. We already published an interview with Nini Molnár and Richárd Demeter fashion designer, now we are focusing on DVA.

DVA was created and designed by Annamária Kaptay and Klaudia Csáki.

Distinctiveness, spontaneity and humour. Perhaps these three words best define both the brand and the designers. This August, DVA celebrated its third year since foundation.

Established with an expressed objective to mix humour or, rather, (self) irony, the brand brings a certain kind of braver and less expected laxity to the Hungarian streetscape.

Since the beginning, the brand and the designers have developed a great deal and their models have also become a lot cleaner, yet the initial vibrant, clearly recognisable, DVA style has never been omitted.

Neither studied to be a fashion designer: Anna graduated from the University of Miskolc and ELTE in communication and then continued her studies at BME, as a Russian interpreter and translator, while Klaudia graduated from the Technical University of Budapest as an architect and designer.

When did you decide to build your own brand? Was it a long-time dream or a sudden idea?

Klaudia: I have had that dream for a long time. It began with my love of drawing, continued with my design and production of clothes for Barbie dolls with my mother and I simply did not stop. Fashion design was my dream and the construction-engineering faculty was a compromise. This love came from inside me, though the women in my family also had a huge influence on me with their constant knitting, crocheting, embroidery, dyeing and sewing and I was always around them. When I was little, it was easier to make our own clothes rather than trying to find the right things in the shops.

Anna: I generally go with the flow and begin things randomly. Our brand already existed when I realised I actually enjoy the design part, too. I have always been interested in many things. For a long time I played the piano in competition, there was a time when I loved painting and I also have video recording on a VHS cassette tape of a home fashion show when my cousin Léna and I, totally unexpectedly, wrapped ourselves in my mother’s dresses and combined them with towels. So I definitely have an ‘artistic’ or creative bent, though to be honest I never thought that you could also make a living from it. More and more it seems that I was wrong.

How was DVA born? Did you have any assistance?

We helped each other. We established our brand with a firm determination and have been working hard on it ever since. When we began our work, we were both disappointed with the jobs we were actually doing.

Klaudia: At the time, the construction industry was dying or perhaps it was just beginning to pick up, though nothing yet was being felt of that at all.

Anna: I happened to be working for an advertising agency where I realised I am incapable of performing tasks as part of a process every day instead of creating or producing something tangible, something new and something of my own. That realisation actually crushed me. We both felt that it was time to change and we had nothing to lose. We also found the right partner in each other.

Could you tell us more about the beginning? How did the first success come?

We do not really remember the moment of the actual decision, only that we were making progress. We first met to decide on a name and the second meeting was dedicated to the design of our logo. We did not employ a graphic designer but drew different patterns with a pencil in a checked exercise book by a swimming pool. Later the first gym bags appeared, which were sewn by Klau as an experiment, using the material from an evening dress with silvery glitter. Three years ago, that was still new and nothing similar was available or could be seen. Anna liked them immediately! She took photos of them at home with a borrowed camera and when we put them on Facebook, it soon turned out that others liked them, too. That set us off in this direction and from them on we began to deliberately design the details of the various pieces. The most important thing was that smart materials were used to make sporty designs.

After the bags, the first success was the first fashion show organised for us in Holdudvar. We felt greatly honoured by the request and did not have the guts to reject the invitation though, in fact, we did not have a collection to show at the time. We produced everything from zero in one week. All the clothes and, similarly, the bags. We approached sewing shops, designed the first swimming costumes, which were not yet perfect for the show, and put together our first collection, with prints that we drew ourselves.