Do Computers Dream When They Sleep?

LONDON, United Kingdom — Do computers dream when they sleep? It's a question you'd expect from a sci-fi writer like Philip K. Dick rather than an accessories designer like Anya Hindmarch, whose 50 stores around the world specialise in witty, tactile, handcrafted bags that seem like the very antithesis of anything digital.

But Hindmarch likes a concept on which to hang her bags, and computers gave her all sorts of ideas, starting with a set composed of 120 metre-square cubes, building blocks of design, which came to life, moved around, then retreated into a pulsing dream state. Spectacular! ‎

Hindmarch looked back to vintage digitalia for details like the clasp on a bag (something videogame-ish), or the pattern on a coat (lifted from a Spectrum ZX keyboard, apparently). Oh yes, about those coats. Cleverly reckoning that all a woman needs is a good bag and a good coat, Hindmarch ‎produced a collection of them as accessories to her accessories.

“I don't want to do a whole ready-to-wear,” she explained, 'but it makes sense to amplify the story.' With her typical wit, of course. So a sober coat in navy cashmere featured pockets of friend eggs in mink, or the Ghost from PacMan, or big yellow happy faces. The perfect partner for any of them would have been a pair of Hindmarch's Gruffalo boots.

Taking on technology as an inspiration highlighted the particularity of her product. Hindmarch can't get enough of craft. She's in awe of her little old artisans in Italy who, age be damned, are completely open to the most modern techniques. Her new bags displayed an impressive repertoire of heat sealing, marquetry and a new method of bonding leather with high frequencies instead of stitching. That created colourful patterns like a Rubik's Cube.

More appropriately meta was the pixelated snakeskin pattern printed on real python. Think about that combination of the organic and the artificial for a moment and your head spins. ‎"And I've just scratched the surface," Hindmarch promised.