FRAY - RECESS EDITION (ISSUE 3)

SPRING 2022

F RAY RECESS EDITION

ISSUE 3

dear reader, Remember recess? It’s playtime! Do you have a favorite game? Maybe you like to play pretend. You do you. But whatever you do, we hope you have fun.

When we thought about the theme for our third edition, we did not know exactly what we wanted, but we wanted it to be fun. So, we let the magic of spring be our guide. From blue skies to more spent outdoors, there is so much to love about this time of year. Recess felt like a natural fit to let this energy come alive.

Our spring 2022, our third edition, is our best one yet.

Really, we mean it! Each project is highly collaborative and imaginative–letting recess feel both personal and universal.

Fray is just a year old, but we are confident that, if these projects are any indication, our legacy will be painted by our approach to experimentation, re-evaluation, and our belief that fashion is for everyone because everybody wears clothes. We hope to always work to be the medium where student designers can showcase their work and creativity.

Thank you to everyone who made this issue possible. Fray is who it is because of all the people that work on it, believe in its purpose, and make it their own. The work is done for this edition. Now, it is time to play!

table of contents playtime is not over!...........armando castro playfl expression..........natalie hornberg what's going on and who are all of you?...........jake gale recess in ruin.........chloe goorman digital illustration..........alec black wilshire wesleyan.........julie ordoñez and shasekh augustin first impressions...........siggy soriano we're cool kids, too!........anika kewalramani going to grandma's house.........victoria cornejo transformed by joy..........laurel golbourne in the garden.........tess solot-kehl and hunter julo interviews by mia foster and emmett levy

our team DIRECTORS Zoe Zelken

Xandra Chen Kathryn Machanic Ruby Baden Lasar Elsa Dupuy d'Angeac LAYOUT EDITORS Dylan Ng

Jay Reyes Julia Nacario Siggy Soriano Elsa Dupuy d'Angeac

@elsa edit

collaborators tanvi navile

georgina goldbart

sanidhya sharma pelumi sokunbi

maseo refuerzo natalia chino

emmett levy

daniela eva sweet-coll

cecilia dondorful-amos nakial cross

annabel asher cyann byfield

ethan barrett

oivia andrews

gabby baby-conn

kioni marshall

loic gao

april schwartz

kaitlyn major-hale darreyl williams

dakota jones sita mcguire

jess pablo julie ordoñez

widline senatus kornelia mostrous

cameron williams laila kewalramani meera nemali

cece hawley

realdba

leevon mathews

joby levit mikail haroon allegra dominguez miles modeste

@elsa edit

kelly nano miranda charit narayanan kathy liang LorWood mirembe mcduffie-thurmond

PLAYTIME IS NOT OVER !

With summer on its way, there is a new energy on campus. It seems like this is the perfect time to be more playful than ever. As college students, we need fun, we need our recess. A set time to be playful and free. Here are 4 Wesleyan students from different backgrounds: Annabel Asher (2022), Widline Senatus (2023), Jess Pablo (2024), and April Schwartz (2024). These are their perspective on what recess means to them, their struggles as college students, and how they plan to take back control of their playtime as they grow up.

April Schwartz '24

Widline Senatus '23

Jess Pablo '24

Annabel Asher '22

What does fun mean to you?

(Annabel) “For me, fun means carelessness… not thinking or worrying about what your gonna do or say, just doing it, it is thoughtless, like people at a concert losing themselves” (April) “Fun is a way to distract yourself… so, for me i'll just sit in a parking lot with friends and talk and forget about everything.”

What do you do for fun, what do you do for your version of recess?

(Widline) “I do horseback riding once a week, that hour or two off-campus is both a distraction and relaxation because I am not thinking about physics or anything else... this is something I do to get away from everything” (Annabel) “I freestyle; I will go on YouTube and look up a beat, and I will just record and go off a stream of consciousness… it makes me feel so bubbly inside…I listen to a lot of music. I enjoy pop music. I love Charli XCX, Rosalia, Pink Pantheress” What are your favorite things to wear to feel playful and experience your playtime?

(Jess) “I like to wear staples and neutrals… I take inspiration from the aesthetic simple lifestyle; I think fashion is about matching pieces and feeling comfortable… it’s what makes me feel the prettiest.”

(Annabel) “Anything that highlights my waist, I love a cinched waist moment. A dress that hits the knee or mid-calf that is bodycon, great jewelry, great shoes... platforms, never not platforms” (April) “If I’m gonna go hang out with friends or go to a party then I'm gonna dress in a lot of colors… bows in my hair you know, pins in my hair. I’m also big on denim, that's my thing.”

How has covid affected fun for you?

(Annabel) “As a singer, I haven’t been able to perform or practice. I’m a theater kid I haven’t properly done a play in a long time” (Jess) “It kinda sucked that I lost my freshmen year but still it was unique… it was still an experience, and you gained a lot of character going through something like COVID, and I remind myself that I’m not the only one going through this” How has covid affected your mental health? (If you feel comfortable sharing) (Jess) “I went to boarding school and grew up away from my family which was very hard… but during the lockdown, I got to be back home with my family. I got to cherish family time and strengthen relationships.”

(Annabel) “Once covid hit it was depressing… my outlets are group activities, and I couldn’t do them… I wasn’t enthusiastic about zoom theater… it was not the same”

As college students it can feel like we are at a tug of war, being told we should be having so much fun but also still having expectations of us to be perfect? Do you feel the same way?

(Widline) “It is hard to have fun when we are also worrying about what to do next after college… What are my next steps? I feel like organizing all that is a little scary. I try to remind myself it’s okay if you don’t know what to do next…what will come will come.”

(April) “I agree but I think that will shift with our generation especially because of COVID… we missed two years and then you expect us to just like grow up and forget about enjoying ourselves like get the fuck out of here… yeah there's like this huge pressure, it’s a lot” Is our recess coming back? How do you plan to take back control of your playtime?

(Annabel) “Yes! Last week I had an improv show and it was like the before times, it was so wonderful to just do improv for drunk college kids… I saw people dressing up, going out and dancing.”

(April) “I don't know… I know that I'll overwork myself, but I think the only way for me to have some playtime is to set a limit on how much I take on because otherwise I'll take on a bunch… what you have to do is you have to say - I’m gonna fill this time with this much work - so that my time is not all work.”

(Widline) “This year I tried out for burlesque and am also walking in the SOC fashion show but moving forward I am going to have more fun, travel more, put effort into caring about myself, and do things that make me genuinely happy.”

Four different people and four very different experiences all within one campus. It is fair to say that these past two years have been rough especially as college students figuring things out.

While we want to feel good all the time, this is not always possible. People have been isolated. Socialization was not a thing for a good minute. The college experience in and of itself was taken away from some students. While we can have our recess here and there, it is also important to acknowledge that sometimes we are struggling. Lockdown or not. High energy playtime is not always possible and it's okay to have our down days. It’s okay to feel every emotion, make time for yourself and your version of recess

Photography by Siggy Soriano

By Armando Castro

ARMANDO CASTRO ON FINDING FUN

by mia foster What inspired your project?

So for my project, I interviewed different people about what they do for fun and what their definition of fun is. I also tried to touch on the mental health aspect of fun by asking people what they do to de-stress and find connections on campus. So I wanted to ask the people I'm interviewing to be raw and honest. Like how are you also struggling? Because I know we want to have fun since we're college students, but we're not always having fun. I want the readers to know oh, I’m not the only one who feels isolated sometimes.

So you’re talking about the ideas of play, but then also kind of subverting the expectations of that and accepting the fact that you’re not always going to be having fun all the time?

Yeah, so it's an interview project kind of separate from the fashion aspect of it. For example, one of the questions asks, what do you wear when you want to have fun? And it could be anything that the person being interviewed wants - like it could even be them in a robe, just relaxing. But, I think so far the person I've interviewed likes to have more fun, playful fashion. So, I'll just ask them to show off their playful fashion for the photoshoot.

Would you say dressing up is in any way important to your mental health today?

I do think I feel like that. I definitely feel a spark of joy when I put an effort into an outfit. To me, picking clothes out feels like playing.

I'm a junior majoring in neuroscience. I really like the theme just because when I think of recess, I think of playfulness.

natalie horberg on her creative process by mia foster What inspired your project?

I think when I looked at the theme I thought a lot about playfulness, I feel like it's really easy to undo a lot of that and take away from the seriousness of fashion and kind of just have fun with it. I'm more interested in just playing with clothes and altering them and making them look fun and not really practical and, just kind of more weird.

With my project, I wanted to use a lot of humor and talk about the freedom of being a kid and dressing how you want and how clothes can serve functions that they don't really serve when you're an adult. Especially pockets and stuff. Keeping all these little things that mean a lot, you like wearing kinda like ugly necklaces that you think are really special. Just like stuff like that.

Totally. So you make clothes and make them impractical to today's standards? What was your creative process?

I wanted each item of clothing to be representative of a thing that children do. So one of them is collection. Like when I was a kid, I would tend to collect things and like, like trash and rocks and stuff. So one piece has different pockets and so one pocket is see through it's like with netting. It's like the thing that you collect that you want everyone to see and then one pocket is completely sewn up so you can't open it. It's the thing you collect that you don't want anyone to see. Then one is adjustable, you can keep adding to it.

And so there's like that and then another one is self-expression. I got this whiteboard paper stuff that's sticky. And I cut it out into squares and then sewed it onto one of the shirts. ThenI sewed a marker with a string onto it, so you can write onto your shirt and then erase it.

Storytelling is another one, like sewing little paper books onto the sleeves. Kind of just making it literal, but also playful and fun and just like you can do stuff with your clothes.

In terms of the clothes that you created, it seems like you're putting the wearer in that situation of making their own thing out of their clothes. Was that intentional in your process?

I feel like it's nice to give someone the chance to have fun with it. And, I feel like when you're a kid, things can have so many other functions - I would've loved to have a book on my sleeve. It’s fun, kinda dumb cuz like, you can't put that in the wash or anything, but it's just fun.

Do you think there's any specific memory that you can point to that inspires the clothing that you're making?

When I was younger, I really wanted to make clothes and I tried to sew a shirt for the first time when I was in fourth grade. It was the ugliest thing ever. So I think it really frustrated me that it didn't look like what I wanted it to look like. That kind of put me off of fashion in terms of making it because you want something to look beautiful. I think when I revisited it later, as I got older, it was like, oh, I can bring my own talents and it doesn't have to be what everyone else is doing.

Even in making these clothes, I’m kind of disregarding the idea of practicality. I feel like there's always some guilt when you're cutting up a perfectly good shirt. I had to realize, this shirt is just like a piece of paper. I don't have to be precious with it. I think with fashion it's harder for me to cross that line, which is why this project especially was really fun.

So we talked a bunch about play, but do you think nostalgia plays any role in what you made?

I feel like everyone I know is pretty nostalgic. At this age, especially, on the cusp of teenagehood, about to become an adult, you just wanna go back to that carefree place.

Is there a specific musician who you feel encapsulates the ideas or feelings that you want the project to evoke for people?

This musician, Charlene Ye, made this song called magic perfume. She does not have a great singing voice. The son is not that well made, but it's just the most pure raw expression of this innocent love. I feel like that's kind of what the project is.

Like, it doesn't look phenomenal, but it kind of just touches that thing within you.

It's just playful. And it doesn't have to abide by any higher standards.

What's going on and

who are all of you?

Creative Director: Jake Gale Photographer: Jake Gale Models: Loic Gao and Nakial Cross

an interview with jake gale So first of all, what's your name and like, what are you doing for your project for this?

Hi, my name is Jake and my project, it's like low key heavy, but I never intended to be it's about queerness and sexual assault of young people and talking about the cognitive dissonance that occurs between people within both groups of both like maturing a little too young, like past your age, but then also feeling like your growth has been really stunted. And about sort of the feeling of not feeling within your age. So I'm shooting kind of around places around campus that remind me of just like the public schools I went to growing up, like the sci basement bathrooms are a really great example of that. I'm gonna be doing this mishmash of sorts of clothes associated with things like grandpa clothes and tiny little children's clothes and then just sort of seeing the ways that, like those two sort of types of clothes interact on one person. how would you say fashion kind of ties into this theme in terms of ways of dressing, but also the concepts of getting yourself dressed in the mornings.

Getting yourself dressed is obviously like a milestone of childhood. It just opened up the world of like the way that clothing is linked to agency and then also the idea of putting very gendered identities onto kids, like through the stuff that they wear, like what's available to children and the lack of agency that they have over these little aesthetics you're supposed to like put yourself in.

Nostalgia and like childhood, like how would you say that specifically, plays a role in the photo shoot that you're doing?

I know what you mean. Well, one thing I'm excited for the kids' clothes are sort of like those weird different aesthetics that boys are given. I remember this very distinctly, like starting to wear very like plain clothes just cuz I didn't relate to the clothes that were being sold to boys. I'm just interested in the ways that like kids and I guess boys and stuff that queer boys and queer women and queer like gender non-conforming kids too reject the sort of aesthetics that are given to them as children.

Would you say that dress up feels important to your life today? Or is it more of like something that you've rejected through like finding more of your style? Like you don't feel like you put on these modes of armor in a way to face the world in different contexts.

I think it's a mix of both. I definitely feel the modes of armor thing. At the end of the day, the world's rough, we all need armor. Like just cuz you're wearing a bit of armor to give you more confidence, nothing wrong with that. Yeah. I've always loved dress up. I wore dresses as a kid and shit. And you know, the only place you're really allowed to do that is like dress up in your female friend's house when the parents aren't looking. You get so much shit when you're growing up wearing gender nonconforming clothes. So I think dressup has always had a special place in my heart because of that.

Would you say like your project evokes specific nostalgia or a specific memory for you in that way?

It's just based off of, I remember so many times in high school just feeling this really deep discomfort and just constantly feeling very specific moments of feeling like every time I learned a sort of social lesson, it was always a lesson I felt like everyone else had learned like a year ago before. And maybe that was all in my, but it was definitely still connected to like childhood sexual assault shit. So I feel like what I want to do is take those moments and sort of put them in that abstract and see how they look in an almost like editorial way.

RECESS Creative Director

IN RUIN Chloe Goorman

Subversive basics appeared all over the runway this spring. Strange silhouettes, layering, and neutral tones define the trend. Think Mad Max. Growing up in Tucson, Arizona, recess was taking shelter under the nearest ramada, pressing lips against a sunwarmed water fountain, and draping yourself with thin layers of linen to hide skin from the blistering sun.

I’m reminded of the almost apocalyptic-looking outfits worn during Arizona summers when I look at subversive basics.

In this way, the trend seems to reflect our growing anxieties surrounding the global climate crisis. We may need to move toward light, layered clothing as our Earth heats not just for the sake of fashion, but also out of necessity. Not only is the trend a reflection of this crisis, but a possible solution. All can participate in the subversive basics trend because it relies on the reuse and recycling of preexisting pieces, thus limiting clothing waste.

Crochet Emilia Thornton

Photography Elsa Dupuy d'Angeac

OUR PROJECT USES FASHION TO EXPLORE WHAT IT MEANS TO LEAVE OUR CHILDREN WITH A DYING EARTH

Models Models Alicia Alicia Paglia Paglia Andie Andie Leitner Leitner Connor Connor Wrubel Wrubel Cecilia Cecilia Dondorful-Amos Dondorful-Amos

Chloe Goorman on Fashion and the Climate Crisis

By Mia Foster My name is Chloe and I was inspired by the theme and growing up in Tucson, where recess was an ordeal because it was just always so hot, like 115 regularly type of thing. It reminds me of that baking feeling and that reminded me of the desert in general and how even here in Connecticut, everyone's aware that the weather is changing every single year, affected by the global climate crisis. I think we saw that a lot in the 2022 spring fashion show. A lot of people were incorporating subversive basics and Avante apocalypse, with layering and the reused materials, and a lot of DIY. Is there an album that you think encapsulates the ideas your project is communicating?

I feel like Americana by Offspring. It is this weird innocence where some of their songs are so grungy then some of them are really intense and sad. Under the surface there's like a message that's not being fully communicated, but it's touched upon. And it's so weird to have that contrast of childhood and then also extreme grunge.

Would you say the accessibility of basics and the ability to subvert them is something that draws you to them, particularly in the ability to have agency over your own clothes?

Yeah, I'd say so - I feel like we're having a cultural movement toward more accessibility and I do like that it's something anyone can do, anyone could access, you're not inclined to go to forever 21 and buy a fast fashion version of what you're seeing. On the runway or on celebrities, it's something you can really do with what you have. I think that's huge. I find it interesting because subversive basics to me are kind of like a reflection of global climate anxieties, like climate crisis anxieties. Because it literally is like mad max, apocalyptic looking but at the same time it's like in practice, it doesn't require waste, which I appreciate.

Is it your hope that this project will connect the lack of control in childhood with the helplessness a lot people feel toward the climate crisis? Do the clothes communicate this feeling?

Yeah. Like I think it is a really mild form of protest. At least in my project, I kind of want it to be creepy and eerie because children are facing this problem too. And, there is a lack of agency over it. We put agency onto ourselves, try to conserve, which is so important but at the same time it is so much bigger than us. It's like this corporate scale of extreme pollution and like degradation of the earth. I almost feel like it's an acceptance of it, like an embrace of it.

Does your project evoke any sort of particular nostalgia or specific memory from your childhood?

I think I'm drawing back on a memory of like it being so hot and then like going and like some soccer mom brings orange slices and it's just amazing to have that like relief. So I feel like it is kind of drawing on, the simple pleasures of childhood, you're kind of having this horrible thing maybe happening around you and it's really innocent. You don't really have to worry about those things at that moment.

alec black digital illustrator

FIRST IMPRESSIONS

Creative Director: Siggy Soriano Creative Assistant: Victoria Cornejo Photographer: Siggy Soriano Models: Cecilia Dondorful-Amos, Jake Gale, Daniela Eva Sweet-Coll

an interview with siggy soriano What inspired the project that you're doing for this issue of Fray?

I guess what inspired me was I've seen a lot of thermal handprint fashion, on clothes and stuff. So I was like, this is cool and kind of recess through children’s curiosity, that was kind of my inspiration.

Totally. Recess, which is super evocative, like childhood pretend, play and the soldier. For you, how would you say fashion ties in or relates to this theme?

I guess the way you express. You can have a bunch of colors and that's kind of playful. Um, but you can also dress down as well or dress up.

The creativity that allows you to have is childlike in a way.

Yeah. Like real creative direction, like how you grew up as a child and how that influences you.

How would you say you play with fashion? Like the different modes of dress?

I definitely like to play around with different silhouettes and things that really don't look good together but then make it work. Yeah, cause traditionally I feel like some colors don't match and some patterns don't match. I feel like it's important to be able to match them with your own personal style.

Totally. Like, just because it's traditionally not something that goes together doesn't mean that that's a rule. Does your project evoke any sort of nostalgia specifically?

Yeah, I think the colors for sure, then also the handprints for actions. There's a hand on the shoulder, on the waist. So it was like they're dancing and I have one that's like a sweatshirt as if it's like hugging. I think those are very nostalgic for me.

If you had to put your project to a song or something that reflects it, do you have any idea of what song you would choose?

Maybe Remi Wolf, she's very playful in the way she dresses. Like there's so many different sounds going on. I think it's very evocative of childhood.

And finally, how did the making process for the clothing go?

I just took a bunch of my clothes that I already had. They were all black and then I just painted hand prints on it and it looks really good.

going to

grandma's

house

CREATIVE TEAM CREATIVE DIRECTOR......................................VICTORIA CORNEJO PHOTOGRAPHER............................................ VICTORIA CORNEJO MODELS........................................................... JESSICA JARA WILLIAMS, SIGGY SORIANO, ALEJANDRA SANCHEZ, CALIA CHRISTIE

This piece is a reimag

agining of my youth.

going to my grandma’s house was a magical, almost spiritual, experience

play and curiosity took precedence over everything.

I remember the scent of fresh-cu

ut grass, and vibrant colors

sunlight that never ended

an Victoria interview with

Cornejo

Q: First of all, what's your name? What inspired the project that you're doing for Fray? This issue?

My name's Victoria Cornejo, and I guess what inspired the project was like, my grandma used to crochet when I was younger and then I sort of like thought it wasn't that cool when I was younger her, but then when, as I got older I realized I could make clothes out of it. And I decided that I wanted to like, I guess, pay homage to my grandma and like the skills that she showed me by doing this project, like going to grandma's house.

Q: For you, how would you say fashion relates to this theme?

Yeah. I feel, at least for me, I feel like fashion. Like nothing's ever new. I feel like when it comes to fashion, it's always like taking something that already happened and putting our own spin on it. Totally. I feel like fashion has like an entire thing is nostalgia in and of itself. So I feel like that's how it relates to that theme. We're never really done with anything that we've seen already.

Q: Do you feel like dressing up is still a part of your life today in any way? Or do you use that tradition to put on clothes in the morning or is it different now?

Yeah, I think, I think when I do get dressed in the morning, I think of it as dress up. Um, and I wish like the same confidence I had when I was younger, totally transpired to like transfer to like what I do in the morning now, but I can see myself like putting on something that's like, not what I usually wear, but then not really wearing it outside, but I do do dress up like in my own room. t yeah, I wish I still had that same confidence. .

Q: Do you think that there's a pinpointable memory that inspired the project?

Yeah, I think one thing that I thought about when I was coming up with the idea was this picture that I found of myself and I was like nine or 10 and I was in this like matching crochet thing that my grandma made. It was just a cute little crochet thing that I used to always wear around the house. And it reminded me of like, like the kind of fashion and stuff I used to like when I was little and I wanted to just bring it back and put it on, you know, girls my age and totally.

Q: If you had to choose a song to reflect your project or encapsulate your project in, what would you choose?

Yeah, there's a song. I mean, it's not mainstream or anything but it's like a song that my grandma used to play a lot, it's called Suddenly by Olivia Newton John And so I really like that song and my mom and my grandma both like that song and just reminds me of her crochet and me watching her, so I feel like that would be the song I also listen to it when I'm crochet now. So, it's just a relaxing song. It's like a legacy.

Q: What does the theme of like recess mean to you?

I think the theme of recess is about that sort of confidence that you had when you were a kid. When I think of recess, I think of kids just like interacting with each other and not being afraid to talk to each other or play games with one another. There was no overthinking in your head about interactions so I think about things like confidence and freedom that we used to have as kids and that plays into fashion as well. I think when I think about recess, I think about bringing that back and feeling confident and wearing something that, you know, isn't standard or normal or whatever