Studio Jobs designer Job Smeets has designed Life on Mars, a window installation for fashion brand Hermès that will be on display in stores across France.
Named after the song by British artist David Bowie, the Life on Mars installation depicts the fictional colonisation of Mars by a set of characters with horse heads and their "space dog".
Life on Mars features surreal characters
The sets, which nod to the climate crisis, feature a French frites shop on top of a volcano and a Mars Rover carrying an Hermès bag.
"Hermès interprets my ideas in its own incredible way from my drawings of this surreal utopia, or maybe you could call it a dystopia," Smeets said. "It's a textile outcome created with fabrics, leathers, sand, intricate stitching that only the atelier of Hermès can produce."
One window houses a sculpture of a volcano topped with a frites shop
"I believe the theme is about climate change, as well as utopian escapism and also about the current conversation of us leaving this planet to colonize Mars," he told Dezeen.
"Especially when the world seems to be on fire, it would be ignorant to create a perfect summer scene," he added. "Something throughout all my work is a serious subject tied up often in humour."
Job worked with Hermès' studio to create the 11 installations, which will be shown across 80 windows in all but one of the brand's 28 French stores.
Designer Job Smeets worked together with Hermès on the project
All the objects were handmade by Hermès using the company's own leathers, wool and fabric.
To Smeets, Life on Mars was an interesting divergence from his regular work, which usually involves him and the Studio Job team crafting pieces using materials such as bronze, wood and metal.
"Through someone else's atelier, especially a fashion and luxury house, a whole new result is formed," he said. "It's really an honour to have my work crafted by Hermès."
Some pieces reference earlier work by Smeets
The designer referenced some of his earlier pieces in the window installations, including the bubbling volcano structure he previously used in works including Train Crash Table.
This was among the sketches proposed by Smeets to Hermès when designing the windows, which ended up being a collaborative effort between the designer and the brand.
"I proposed some products in my sketches, like watches for the flasher, the bubbling shoes, the bag in the volcano," he said. "And of course, with the dog and the dining table, it was a straightforward choice."
A Mars Rover is among the installations
The fashion brand was very open to suggestions for what could be placed in the windows, the designer said.
"It was a lovely collaboration with them as they were open to using anything in the windows with very few rules," Smeets explained.
"They had some great ideas. For example, based on my sketch, they proposed waved belts could work for the flying cake, topped with Hermès lipsticks as the candles."
"We played with packaging and typical Hermès artefacts and icons that were used, such as their pet accessories on our Mars dogs and the large horse collars inspired by the Hermès's own family collection and heritage," he added.
The Life on Mars collaboration marks the first time Smeets has worked with the fashion house, with another joint project already underway.
The installations will be on show in stores across France
Life on Mars will be on display in Hermès windows across France throughout the summer.
Previous projects by Smeets for his Studio Job include a "surrealist take on classical church windows" and the studio's own maximalist headquarters in Antwerp.
The photography is by Alex Jonas.
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