In a rare convergence of American art history, institutional reverence, and contemporary fashion narrative, the New York-based label Bode has partnered with the Calder Foundation and the Whitney Museum of American Art for a limited-edition capsule collection. The collaboration is timed to celebrate the centennial of Alexander Calder’s Cirque Calder (1926–31), one of the museum’s most beloved and formative works. Calder’s original creation—a sprawling, miniature spectacle constructed entirely from humble materials like wire, cork, fabric, and string—shares a profound artistic DNA with Bode’s own approach, which elevates found textiles and historic ephemera into wearable, narrative-driven fashion. Designed through the meticulous lens of Bode’s founder, Emily Adams Bode Aujla, the eight-piece collection translates the movement, wit, and ingenious materiality of the artist’s tiny performers into exquisitely detailed, modern garments and accessories, proving that the most powerful stories often reside in the smallest, most unexpected details.
The Centennial of Ephemera: Why Calder’s Circus Endures
The impetus for this landmark collaboration is the Whitney Museum’s major exhibition, High Wire: Calder’s Circus at 100, which revisits the genesis of one of modern art’s most crucial creations. Conceived by a young Alexander Calder while living in Paris, Cirque Calder was not simply a static sculpture, but a multi-act, two-hour performance art piece. Calder would personally animate over one hundred miniature figures—including a lion tamer, clowns, acrobats, and the iconic Fanni, the Belly Dancer—for intimate audiences of avant-garde peers like Marcel Duchamp and Joan Miró.
This early work is a touchstone for Calder’s entire career, revealing his initial, profound fascination with movement, balance, suspense, and ephemerality. It was this kinetic sensibility, this ability to transform static material into dynamic performance, that led directly to his pioneering invention of the mobile sculpture just a few years later. The exhibition, and by extension, the fashion collection, traces the lineage from these whimsical, handcrafted figures to the abstract masterpieces that would define twentieth-century art. The enduring appeal lies in the Circus’s combination of radical artistic innovation with a childlike sense of wonder, capturing a spontaneous spirit that remains infectious a century later.
A Shared Language of Humility and Handwork
The partnership between the Calder Foundation and Bode is perhaps the most natural collaboration in recent high-fashion history, founded on a deep, shared respect for materiality and narrative craft. Emily Adams Bode Aujla, the brand’s founder, has built her label on the principle of elevating salvaged textiles, historical ephemera, and traditional hand-sewing techniques into pieces of wearable memory. This philosophy echoes the very essence of Calder’s Circus.
As Bode Aujla herself noted, “Calder’s Cirque captures a sense of wonder, movement, and craftsmanship, telling a story through each piece—much like the way I create collections.” Both artists are masters of bricolage, transforming humble, everyday objects—Calder used cork, wire, and cloth; Bode uses antique trims, vintage quilts, and yarn—into something emotionally resonant and profoundly valuable. The collaboration pays homage to Calder’s ingenious use of found materials, which prefigured modern concepts of upcycling and sustainability. Bode’s distinctive lens reinterprets this inventive materiality, ensuring that each of the eight pieces in the capsule collection functions as a hand-wrought tribute to the artist’s inventive mind.
The Star Performers: Apparel that Tells a Story
The limited-edition collection translates the theatricality of the Circus acts directly into high-fashion garments, focusing on specific characters and costumes through Bode’s signature hand-finished techniques. Two apparel pieces stand out as the primary narrative vehicles: the Calder Fanni Fringe Skirt and the Calder Painted Cirque Long Sleeve Shirt.
The Calder Fanni Fringe Skirt is a modern interpretation of the costume worn by Fanni, the Belly Dancer, one of the Circus’s most popular figures. The skirt is designed with silky, cascading fringe that references Fanni’s dynamic stage presence, emphasizing movement and flow. It is finished with a delicate crocheted waistband and sparkling rhinestone flourishes, echoing the light, performative quality of the original miniature costume. This piece is a testament to Bode’s ability to take historic reference and translate it into a contemporary, visually striking garment that retains a sense of whimsicality.
The Calder Painted Cirque Long Sleeve Shirt is perhaps the most illustrative example of the collection’s dedicated craftsmanship. Handmade in Bode’s New York studio, the cotton shirt is hand-painted with reproductions of Calder’s own illustrations of animals and performers. The garment is finished with antique trim and subtle, theatrical details: French tricolor rosettes trim the cuffs, and antique milliner flowers—referencing the garlands used in the Circus’s Chariot Race act—adorn the collar points. Priced in the thousands, this shirt is less a piece of clothing and more a commissioned, wearable piece of art that required meticulous, artisanal labor.
Wearable Mementos: The Art of Archival Detail
The accessories and graphic tees in the collection act as miniature, wearable pieces of the Circus’s history, drawing heavily from archival ephemera that deepens the collaboration’s context. The two brooches in the collection, Calder Leo Brooch and Calder Fanni Brooch, are small sculptural wonders crafted from yarn and cotton stuffing, directly referencing the materiality of Calder’s original wire figures. The Leo Brooch is a nod to the Lion Tamer act, while the Fanni Brooch features tiny rhinestone accents and stitched identifiers, bringing the tiny performance character to life.
The collection also utilizes vintage photographs and archival documents. The Calder Identity Card Tee is particularly significant, featuring a print of Calder’s original 1926 identity card on the front, and a period-specific French critic’s review of the Circus on the back. The Calder Suitcase Tee features a remastered still from a 1955 film, capturing Calder himself unpacking his delicate, wire-and-cork performers from their original traveling cases. These graphic pieces transform historical documents into highly sought-after fashion artifacts, giving the wearer a direct, tangible connection to the early moments of 20th-century modernism.
The Traveling Show: The Suitcase as Sculpture
Perhaps the most unique item in the collaboration, and one that fully embraces the essence of Calder’s itinerant performance art, is the Calder Suitcase Box. This wooden keepsake box is an accessory in itself, modeled after the original five suitcases that housed and transported Cirque Calder as the artist performed it across Europe and America.
Adorned with reproduced hotel decals, antique travel stamps, and the artist’s own painted signature, the box is a tribute to the Circus’s status as a truly portable, radical piece of art—a traveling show that could be staged anywhere for anyone. The Suitcase Box, which was one of the first pieces to sell out upon the collection’s October 22nd launch, functions as a tangible symbol of the collaboration itself, commemorating the joint effort between the Whitney Museum, the Calder Foundation, and the Bode brand. Its highly exclusive availability in Bode’s flagship stores in New York, Los Angeles, and Paris, as well as the Whitney Shop, solidifies the collection’s status as a must-have convergence of art and fashion.
