When I was introduced to Midjourney, an AI program that creates images from text and image prompts, I realized immediately that is the perfect tool to use to imagine and explore different visions of fashion design.

I’ve been fascinated by the high/low culture idea of a denim suit. If you’ve been following along for a while, you’ll know that I made a traditional denim suit jacket. I wanted to push the idea of a traditional suit design. Midjourney is the perfect tool for that.

But first, I looked for inspiration from famous designers. If Spanish couturier Cristóbal Balenciaga, famous for his craftsmanship and innovation, designed a denim suit in 2023, what might that look like? Midjourney helped me envision that. The prompts are easy. Here’s the first one:

/imagine women’s denim suit in the style of Balenciaga 2023

And here’s the result; a 4-up set of images that Midjourney generated based on it’s library of images of Balenciaga designs as well as images of suits, and denim.

Midjourney’s images are Wow! The top left is the most complete style with a purse, hat, and earrings. The upper right is a slim-fit boiler suit with bell cuffs. The lower left has mermaid pants and balancing wings on the shoulders. The bottom right has a military jacket and cargo pants with pockets at the knee extending down. Note the backgrounds are all white.

I’ve been studying Wes Anderson and his films lately. His style is full of saturated colors and rich detail. So what would a denim suit look like done in the style of Wes Anderson? Here’s the Midjourney prompt:

/imagine women’s denim suit in the style of Wes Anderson

And here’s the result:

The upper left design is a pale pink, not denim blue at all, and is quite possibly not made of denim fabric either given the drape. The upper right design is also a take on a boiler suite of sorts, say 1950s style. The lower left has pink piping around the pocket tops at waist and chest. The bottom right has bias binding outlining the chest pocket, collar and lapel, shoulder, waist dart, and pants pockets. Note that most of the backgrounds contain a scene and rich color.

I selected my two favorite designs, one from Balenciaga and one from the Wes Anderson prompt.

Midjourney makes it easy to combine ideas and mashups by allowing you to blend up to 6 images to come up with a new vision. So I uploaded these 2 images to Midjourney and blended my two favorites.

/blend image 1 (Balenciaga fave) and image 2 (Wes Anderson fave)

Midjourney kept Balenciaga’s solid blue but lightened it to a more Anderson palette and added an Anderson pink. Three of the versions are boiler suits and three of the versions have topstitched outlines as accents. Note the background is neutral but with slightly more context.

Sadly none of Balenciaga’s creative silhouettes in cuffs, pantlegs, or shoulders remain. This sadness tells me that my women’s denim suit needs to have an innovative or unusual silhouette. However, of the designs that Midjourney generated, I did have a favorite.

The piping lends formality that offsets the tender pale blue color and informal material. Directionally, there’s something 1940s airline stewardess uniform about it all. (For more images of the history of airline stewardess uniforms, see this Southern Living post.)

Not quite the design I am after but this exercise helped clarify my vision, and saved me from making a version I’m not quite after. For an hour or two investment, that’s a tremendous payoff.