“It all started with a long sick bed, quite soon after I graduated,” the fashion designer Yorick Westerkamp tells me. “At one point, I was physically unable to make work, while my mind kept generating ideas.” During that time of creative stasis, while marooned in his home, Westerkamp envisioned a collection built solely from the clothes he already owned, using just the tools at his disposal to dream himself out of his current environment. “When I was in recovery two years later, I turned my bedroom into a small atelier and photo studio and started draping intuitively on friends and family,” he continues. “A fantasy collection was built, made from my own wardrobe, held together only by clips, built from my imagination.”

Westerkamp named his new brand (PAPA) Yorick, and its first collection clips, swaddles and hems his garments, boldly proposing new silhouettes from an existing wardrobe. Before his debut line, Westerkamp studied at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie in Amsterdam, where current Jean Paul Gaultier creative director Duran Lantink was the examiner for his final collection. The designer was also briefly a part of The Patchwork Family, the raucous fashion collective that staged guerrilla shows in Amsterdam. “I liked their philosophy of working together as young designers and supporting each other, rather than competing,” says Westerkamp. “I respect their punk, anti-establishment approach to fashion.”

In the conversation below, we catch up with Westerkamp about working with the collective, the direction of his new brand, plus the designers he’d put on his Fashion Mount Rushmore.

Hey Yorick – can you talk me through the inspiration for this first collection?

Yorick Westerkamp: It all started with a long sick bed, quite soon after I graduated. At one point, I was physically unable to work, while my mind kept generating ideas. I had to resource what was available to me, which became the anchor of the collection: my own wardrobe. I started fantasising about a collection built only from the clothes I owned. During that time, I found metal office clips in my apartment. That formed the system.

When I was in recovery two years later, I turned my bedroom into a small atelier and photo studio and started draping intuitively on friends and family. A fantasy collection was built, made from my own wardrobe, held together only by clips, built from my imagination, shaped through the embodiment of friends and family, and grounded in the narrative of my own clothing.

Can you tell me about the different characters in the collection and why you wanted to represent them each?

Yorick Westerkamp: After creating almost 300 looks for around 30 friends and family, I printed all the looks and covered my bedroom wall with them. With the team I slowly started to gather, we began organising, grouping and collaging the images to create this collection. From that, five categories were developed: farmers, sailors, pirates, maidens, and aristocrats. They resided in an imaginative space, and through the act of categorising these characters, the collection started to take shape and make sense. Art directors Ferdi Sibbel and Robin Burggraaf helped developed the universe around these characters, while Kathinka Gernant developed the beauty direction and Hester Wernert expressed them through fantastical hair looks.

“During my studies, my approach was questioned a lot… I was trying to be provocative, but looking back, I didn’t fully own my design language yet” – Yorick Westerkamp

What’s your background in fashion?

Yorick Westerkamp: When I was 18, I left my small village and ended up in Sydney. I told people there I had finished fashion school, which wasn’t true, and somehow ended up working in the studio for Ellery. Later I studied at the Gerrit Rietveld Academie, where Duran Lantink, also a former student, was the examiner for my final collection. I’ve interned and worked with several designers and brands, including Vaquera in New York City.

Alongside my own brand, I also work on costume design for film. It exists as another branch of my practice, where I can push the same sense of drama through a different context.

What was your involvement with The Patchwork Family?

Yorick Westerkamp: Straight after graduating from the Gerrit Rietveld Academie, I worked at a sex club to earn money. They did their first show there, and soon after asked me to join. I liked their philosophy of working together as young designers and supporting each other rather than competing. I participated in several shows during Berlin Fashion Week and Amsterdam Fashion Week. To this day, I still feel connected to them. I respect their punk, anti-establishment approach to fashion.

How did the time in the collective influence your fashion designs?

Yorick Westerkamp: It gave me confidence in my way of working. During my studies, my approach was questioned a lot, especially my unconventional way of working and my take on disregarding the need to create something new. I was trying to be provocative, but looking back, I didn’t fully own my design language yet. Being part of the collective gave me the space to develop that ownership. It allowed me to become clearer and more direct in how I approach making work.

Now for some quickfire questions… who were your fashion icons growing up?

Yorick Westerkamp: My mum. She was the embodiment of a Mugler girl. Every Saturday night, as she got ready to go out, I’d pick outfits from her wardrobe and style her: high heels, stockings, pencil skirts, low-cut jackets, smoky eyes.

Time travel has been perfected – which famous fashion show are you beaming into the front row?

Yorick Westerkamp: No. 13, Alexander McQueen, SS98.

Did you have a freakum outfit growing up?

Yorick Westerkamp: I liked Canadian tuxedos.

Which four designers are in your Fashion Mount Rushmore?

Yorick Westerkamp: Miguel Adrover, Miuccia Prada, Alexander McQueen, Elsa Schiaparelli.

What’s the most ran-through item in your wardrobe?

Yorick Westerkamp: A pair of Versace boxer briefs I stole from a hook-up. I still wear them weekly for almost ten years now.

Send the most recent picture/screenshot on your camera roll.

Yorick Westerkamp: At my therapist’s light tunnel (the most recent is NSFW).

Money is no object – where are you staging your next catwalk show?

Yorick Westerkamp: I’d build a massive 90s locker room, huge open showers, all switched on and running hot: steamy. The audience would be placed right inside.

What is your earliest fashion memory?

Yorick Westerkamp: I have lots of early memories, but one stands out. When I was around five, my mum took me shopping for shoes. I fell for a pair of baby blue hospital slip-ons. She never said no, even though they were probably hideous. I wore them to school and got made fun of, which made me insecure. But I reminded myself I thought they were cool, and I kept rocking them.

You encounter a hostile alien race and fashion is their only mechanism for communication. What would you make them to inspire them to spare you and the rest of the human race?

Yorick Westerkamp: Lingerie for all. Nothing more convincing than seduction.

If you could only wear one designer for the rest of your life, who would it be?

Yorick Westerkamp: Hard to pick, I’m exploring my heterosexuality as an aesthetic these days, so most fashion is off-limits. If I had to choose, it would be Helmut Lang Men’s Spring 1998, and only that collection.

Scroll through the gallery at the top of the page to see (PAPA) Yorick’s entire debut collection