Viktor & Rolf: Dutch design duo realise dream

Clothing exhibited in a gallery setting is not something all fashion designers feel comfortable with. Very few working in the industry today would ever describe their work as art. Fashion is a craft, as everyone from superpowers such as Rei Kawakubo to Karl Lagerfeld down would be quick to point out. It is also, clearly, a commercial venture. Add to this the fact that fashion is very much a live concern – transforming itself at a rate which only the most dedicated can keep up with – and it's small wonder that the museum backdrop is viewed with a certain amount of suspicion at least.

That said, there can be few labels more suited to a gallery environment than Viktor & Rolf. The Dutch-born design team – Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren – not only approach fashion as an ideas-based medium first and foremost but also, back in the autumn of 1996, showed one of their earliest collections – they called it Launch – in the Amsterdam Torch gallery in the first place. This was famously crafted entirely in miniature and, alongside the clothes themselves, there was a mini marketing campaign and a limited-edition perfume bottle notable for the fact that it couldn't actually be opened. Ever.

"We wanted to create a new world," the designers say in the catalogue published to accompany their first major show in London, opening at the Barbican this week. "We created a series of miniature installations visualising our strongest ambitions. A doll on a catwalk, a doll in a photo studio, a miniature shop and so forth. The dolls were an abstraction of people and the scenes they enacted, showing a life we desired but only dared to dream of."

More than 10 years on and Viktor & Rolf have realised that dream, showing a full-sized women's ready-to-wear collection in Paris biannually, designing a menswear line and boasting two bestselling fragrances – Flowerbomb for her, Antidote for him – which may be easily opened and liberally applied should any consumer so wish.

For the Barbican show, however, the designers have chosen to go back to their roots – at least part of the show is dedicated, once again, to small but perfectly formed and very slightly sinister Viktor & Rolf-clad dolls. The House of Viktor & Rolf, as the exhibition is called – the title is a witty twist on the concept itself which, at the time of writing, is being kept strictly under wraps – will showcase many of the designers' most remarkable pieces, miniature and otherwise. It follows their development right from 1992, the year before, straight out of college, they won the prestigious fashion competition at Hyères in southern France, to the present.

Work on display includes haute couture pieces. Viktor & Rolf occupied this most rarefied of worlds before exploding on to the ready-to-wear circuit in March 2000. Atomic Bomb (1998–1999), a collection which featured clothing imitating the shape of a mushroom cloud, and Russian Doll (1999–2000), in which the model Maggie Rizer was dressed by the designers themselves in the entire collection – 10 looks in total, layered one on top the other – are both centre stage.

If ready-to-wear is all too often a watered-down interpretation of creatively liberated couture, that was never likely to be the case here. Like John Galliano and Alexander McQueen, Viktor & Rolf are all too aware of the potentially huge impact of any imagery springing from their shows to settle for half measures. And so, to introduce the aforementioned Flowerbomb to the press, they put together a tableau vivant of the world's most beautiful models wrapped in bow-bedecked, sugar-sweet pink clothing which made even the most hardened fashion follower smile. For Black Hole (2001-2002) – a collection of twisted variations of classic French clothing all crafted in black – models were painted in the inky hue to match, right from the roots of their hair to the very tips of their toes. Viktor & Rolf have in the past put Tilda Swinton on their catwalk surrounded by models styled to look just like her and have commissioned live performances by Tori Amos and Rufus Wainwright. To sum up, the pair make the conventional catwalk presentation appear about as interesting as a Saturday morning trip to Tesco. Oh, and the clothes aren't half bad either.

'The House of Viktor & Rolf': Barbican Art Gallery, London EC2 (0845 120 7550, www.barbican.org.uk/artgallery), 18 June until 21 September

Let's go Dutch: How to get the look

When faced with couture collections as weirdly wonderful as this, it can be hard to imagine how the look might filter down to the more mundane realm of everyday life. An oversized pink bow orcantilevered collar may look fantastic on the catwalk, but neither is quite the thing for a dinner date, let alone a trip to the supermarket (unless, of course, you are Tilda Swinton).

The good news is that Viktor & Rolf, like all savvy designers, also do a very nice line in ready-to-wear that mixes the conceptual with the commercial. For example, in this season's collection, inspired by the French Pierrot, there are statement ruff collars accessorised with model violins, but there are also pretty shift dresses and separates in delicate silk and chiffon, embellished with rose motifs. The accompanying shoes and bags are a good way of introducing flashes of quirkiness.

For those on budgets more suited to high-street than high-end, the duo has kindly lent their shared hand to some cult collaborations – past, present and future – that are higher in style than price. Collectible pieces from their sell-out H&M collection in 2006 are still to be had on eBay, while their fabulous Shu Uemura false lashes have fashionistas fighting in the beauty halls. And next year a collection for luggage label Samsonite goes on sale.

And, of course, there is always the perfume.A limited-edition bottle of Flowerbomb, to celebrate the show, will be on sale in the Barbican and at Selfridges for £80. Rhiannon Harries

Viktor & Rolf is stocked at Souvenir (020 7287 9877, www.souvenirboutique.co.uk)

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