Certainly one of the most interesting things I saw at Milan Design Week was Carlos Mate’s The Flowers of Evil. He says he created the collection to show that people’s darker sides can be beautiful and attractive too. He cites Rimbaud’s poem “A Season in Hell” as his inspiration. Here’s a quote from that poem to give you a flavour; “I have called for plagues, to suffocate in sand and blood. Unhappiness has been my god.”

And later “…dear Satan, don’t look so annoyed, I beg you! And while waiting for a few belated cowardices, since you value in a writer all lack of descriptive or didactic flair, I pass you these few foul pages from the diary of a Damned Soul.” The last line is telling as Carlos also says the pieces he created are a “catalogue of feelings or a pagan diary”.

They’ve definitely got a dark side, but I think they also have a Tim Burton-esque friendliness about them. I think Carlos has done what he set out to do – they’re beautiful, in their own very distinct way.

Photography © Katie Treggiden