I read a story today about Belgian designers and why they are of the moment. Their austere nature, simple lines, and hard core discipline happens to coincide with the strained economic times. There was more. But, what really captivated me was the fact that all these incredible designers, like Martin Margiela, Ann Demeulemeester and Dries Van Noten (all personal favorites) graduated from the same school- The Antwerp Royal Academy of Fine Arts.  Today, in Paris Maison Martin Margiela had an amazing show, despite rumours that he's leaving the label.   So now I need to know about Antwerp. 

I decided I wanted to know about the place that produces such great artists.  Googled the Antwerp Royal Academy of Fine a Arts and this is what came up:

 The Antwerp Royal Academy of Fine Arts (Koninklijke Academie voor Schone Kunsten van Antwerpen) is one of the oldest of its kind in Europe. It was founded in 1663 by David Teniers the Younger, painter to the Archduke Leopold and Don Juan of Austria. By the sixties, in our present century, general opinion had stopped considering the "applied arts" to be of lesser value than the "traditional arts". In accordance with the spirit of the times, a number of new departments were added to the Royal Academy of Fine Arts: graphic design, photography, jewelry design, ceramic arts and Fashion design. Mary Prijot championed the establishment of a fully-fledged fashion department within the Academy. She gave the fashion department an international appeal and set very high creative standards, both for fashion drawing and later, for fashion design. Together with Marthe Van Leemput, who added the subjects of tailoring and pattern design to the curriculum, she drew a blueprint for the fashion department, a plan which still serves its purpose extremely well. Ann Demeulemeester, Dirk Bikkembergs, Walter Van Beirendonck, Dirk Van Saene, Dries Van Noten and Martin Margiela are designers who graduated from the Academy in the beginning of the eighties, when the fashion department was under the patronage of Mary Prijot. 
In the beginning of the eighties, the fashion world and the international media started to get interested in Antwerp fashion designers. From then on, the fashion department of the Royal Academy shared in this international interest, not in the least because of the continuous quality of the collections designed by some of the now aforementioned famous ex-students and a new generation of designers as Veronique Branquinho, A.F. Vandevorst, Stephan Schneider, Bernhard Willhelm, Bruno Pieters, Tim Van Steenbergen, Peter Pilotto, Les Hommes/ Bart Van Den Bossche and Tom Notte, Haider Ackermann, Kris Van Assche amongst many others.

Belgian designers have been generating heat in the fashion world since the mid 1990's, when they were often viewed as the greatest thing since the Japanese designers who emerged, clutching deconstructionist scissors, in the early 80's. This lively, elucidating exhibition lets nonfashionistas see a bit of the fire. With 75 ensembles, most from the last five years, it shows the work of 10 designers, all but one of whom (Olivier Theyskens) attended the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp. Several of the names will be familiar, especially Martin Margiela, Ann Demeulemeester and Dries Van Noten, members of the so-called Antwerp Six, who attended the academy in the late 1970's and early 80's.

Starting with Mr. Margiela, the idea of deconstruction is batted around this show like a volleyball at a leisurely team practice, with each player giving it a different, confidant spin. Garments are taken apart, reassembled, reused and misused, as exemplified by a trench coat reconfigured as an evening gown by Dirk Van Saene, another member of the Antwerp Six, or a humble cotton skirt that Mr. Van Noten has loaded with a ball gown's worth of beads.

Sources include military uniforms, hospital gowns, pop culture, extreme-exercise garments and vintage clothing. At one deconstructionist extreme is Walter Van Beirendonck's ''Dissection'' jacket, which has one sleeve cut away to reveal a cross section of different fabrics, although the clothes of the two-designer team known as A. F. Vandevorst, who have a thing for saddles, can't be discounted. To the other extreme is the understated work of the newly discovered Jurgi Persoons, who decorates his lightweight dresses while he shapes them with visible hand-stitched darts and tucks.

For the most part these clothes don't infantalize or overexpose the body, and many appear to be genuinely comfortable. It is probably too much to ask that they also might be affordable

Cool. I think I need to visit Antwerp.