Anton Belinskiy was born, raised and educated in Ukraine. He studied at Taras Shevchenko Republic Art School (2006) and at the Fashion Institute of Design and Technology (2008) A year after, he launched his namesake womenswear brand. Belinskiy started to show his collections during Mercedes-Benz Kiev Fashion Days, an event organized by Daria Shapovalova in 2010, and soon after he became the headliner of this Fashion Week. He has participated in London Fashion Week and showed collections independently in such locations as the Polytechnic Museum. Anton Belinskiy has also done photoshoots for 032c and Dazed Digital as an art director, screened video with rising film director Masha Vasukova (contributor to AnOther), and styled one of the main stars of Ukrainian local indie music scene, KATYA. Check out Anton Belinskiy on Instagram and Facebook.
Tell us a little bit about yourself and what you do. My name is Anton, I’m from Kiev, Ukraine. I graduated from Republic School of Art. My work has always been related with art and fashion. Before establishing my own brand I’ve been thinking really long on what kind of a brand it has to be. That’s why I’ve been reading a lot of books on fashion, style and the business of fashion. Of course, I continued painting and developing my skills. Step by step, I founded the Anton Belinskiy brand. It was in 2011. Since then, the brand shows the collections within Mercedes-Benz Kiev Fashion Days, at London Fashion Week at Fashion Scout platform, and also at tradeshows abroad.
What are some recent, upcoming or current projects you are working on? Now I’m working on next season: I’m developing pre-Spring and Spring-Summer 2016 collection. Of course, my team is now following up the new orders which I got from new buyers during this successful season. After this season activities, the list of the retailers of Anton Belinskiy brand has grown and starting from the new season you can find my collections in such giant retailers as Harvey Nichols, for example. We are continuing to work hard and we want to raise geography of sales for the next season. I am also preparing a special project with Vogue Italia, which is very artistic. Announcements are coming soon!
How did your interest in art or fashion begin? I’ve been always interested in art, then during my classes at Republic School of Art I learned a lot about art and decided to try and develop myself in fashion. I used to work as a stylist and then in 2011 I’ve showed my first collection at Mercedes-Benz Kiev Fashion Days and the history of Anton Belinskiy brand began.
If you had to explain your work or brand to a stranger, what would you say? Pure avant-garde beauty!
What materials do you use in your work and what is your process like? I use some natural fabrics like cotton, denim and etc. Also I use high-tech fabrics and raincoat fabrics. Process is structured, however there are a lot of creative and fun moments.
What artists or designers are you interested in right now? I’m interested in Prada, Raf Simons, Comme Des Garcons and some Ukrainian and Russian designers of the new wave—my colleagues of a new generation.
What’s your favorite thing about Kiev? People! People are my inspiration, in general!
What are your thoughts about the fashion scene in Kiev? There are lots of opportunities to develop a strong and powerful scene (industry) in Kiev right now. Kiev becomes really international in terms of fashion—I meet more and more designers who are coming to showcase at Mercedes-Benz Kiev Fashion Days along with Ukrainian designers. It is really fast-growing and there are a lot of gifted youth around who are all involved in fashion!
What was the last collection you saw that stuck out to you? Oh, I even can’t recall; this season was full of meetings and I had a lot of things to do while visited Paris as LVMH Prize semi-finalist.
What is your snack of choice when working in your studio? I can eat everything, but nuts, I guess, is the best choice for me.
What are you really excited about right now? As I said previously—people! And, of course, working on my new collections!
If you hadn’t become a designer what do you think you’d be doing? For sure, I would become an artist. I really wanted to become an artist for a long time before I became a designer.
What are you listening to right now? I really love dance and pop music of the 90s! US, UK scene, post-soviet… it doesn’t matter!
Can you share one of the best or worst reactions you have gotten as a result of your work? I guess one of the best is when lots of “celebrities” look at my Fall-Winter collection! Raf Simons, Delfina Arnault, Carine Roitfeld, JW Anderson, Kanye West… Such influential people of the fashion world liked my collection and nothing else could make me happier.