CFE Announces Theme for 8th Bi-Annual Fashion Show: Welcome to the Feast of Fools

The carnival is in town, and you’re all invited! This December, the Circular Fashion Exposition will be celebrating its 8th sustainable fashion show with a Feast of Fools. Drawing on medieval and renaissance-era practices of hedonistic revelry and ritualistic inversions, this theme is all about subverting social norms in extravagantly theatrical ways.

As far as the fashion goes, CFE 8 is looking for designs that draw on the ethos and aesthetics of historical traditions in the vein of the Festival of Fools and Commedia dell’Arte.

The Festival of Fools was a tradition that emerged during the middle ages–though exact origins remain murky–and centered the inversion of cultural and societal norms. For example, lower-ranking members of the local church would dress up as their superiors, sometimes going so far as to elect a “false archbishop” or “false pope” for the day. Locals would engage in masked dances, unscripted plays, and generally enjoy freedom from everyday social customs. This semester, CFE encourages its participants to channel this spirit of subversive merriment on and off the runway.

For more specific aesthetic inspiration, designers have a broad playground to explore in the world of Commedia dell’Arte. Commedia dell’Arte was a form of professional theater that emerged in northern Italy during the 15th century, and rapidly gained popularity for its bombastic improvisational stylings. Plays were performed outside, with actors dressed in colorful costumes and often wearing distinctive masks. Even though many cast members had their faces covered, performances were extremely expressive, thanks in part to the over-the-top acrobatic movements of the actors. The masks themselves were also very expressive, featuring exaggerated eyebrows and noses. These masks weren’t just fancy accessories; they were crucial to understanding the performances, as each mask worn in Commedia dell’Arte is associated with a different kind of stock character, or archetype. 

A few main archetypes crucial to the genre of Commedia include:

Innamorati: Young, upper-class lovers, these characters are often the main source of conflict within the story; they are naive, sympathetic, and romantic 

Vecchi: Older men of society, including greedy merchants, boorish husbands, and inept doctors, these characters tend to cause comedic mishaps for the young lovers 

Zanni: Lower class servants and clowns, these characters can be either witty of foolish, cunning or clumsy, or a combination of contradictions–the famous Harlequin fits into this category