GEORGIA

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My name is Tea Gelashvili. I live in Tbilisi, Georgia.

After receiving the BENEXT award in 2016 I went to study in IED Milano for the Summer school program. After that I won the ”Call for Talents” VOGUE competition and I got 1st prize - opportunity to study Master in Fashion Design in Domus Academy in Milan. During my studies I had an opportunity to collaborate and intern with such great brands as Versus-Versace, Fondazione GFF, Marni and Gil Sander.  After my graduation I came back to Tbilisi and founded my brand Synesthesiac. I was showing at  Mercedez-Benz Fashion Week Tbilisi, Fashion Graduate Italia,Vietnam Fashion Week and Milan Fashion Week Digital.  

I have changed my professional path at the age of 35 because creating clothes for people to make them feel beautiful and unique is what makes me happy and fulfilled. Besides my brand is my very personal kind of communication with the world around me, it is the language which I speak to the people. SYNESTHESIA – sensory phenomenon in which people see characters, numbers or music inherently coloured. SYNESTHESIAC - Is the person who’s constantly experiencing that sensation through his/her life. Synethesiac – It Sounds colour. As a person experiencing the sensory phenomenon of synaesthesia and being mostly introverted, I might not feel comfortable talking a lot about how I feel, or what is my perception of the world, but everything that is important for me to say or valuable to support is the core of my creations. It is like an inner state of mind that needs to be expressed out and germinate through my creative process into the material world around me.

Synesthesiac is my way of being an extroverted introvert, bold but subtle, controversial but harmonic, expressive but intimidating, colorful but melodic, innovative but sustainable. I let my “archetype of the girl” to wear emotionally speaking clothes and at the same time letting her be different, yet on-trend and attractive. Speaking about her, generally, she has techno-street-kind-of-style and has a lot of art and music as an influence. Nevertheless, she is recognized as an individual with noticeably unique taste within her personal society. The clothes that I make, in general, represent the juxtaposition of the street and glam, hard and soft. It sounds nostalgic - back to 90’s, yet the very today’s techno vibes. It is austere in a way, as it recalls back to the scant choice of our soviet childhood/culture in its rough shapes, but at the same time it is very vivid, bright and sexy in a sophisticated and modern way. I am working between Tbilisi and Milan and that is giving me the possibility to work with Italian materials yet producing in Georgia. We prefer to use sustainable- driven materials, so we work on obtaining new suppliers which are working on that direction, as being an ethical brand is very important for us. We believe that not only the brands but also the new generations of potential clients will care more and more about the environment and ethical production.