Belgian designer Marina Yee, one of the trailblazing Antwerp Six, has passed away at 67. Her visionary approach helped put Belgian fashion on the global map and continues to inspire new generations.
Belgian fashion designer Marina Yee, a founding member of the Antwerp Six who revolutionized fashion in the 1980s, has died at the age of 67, the Antwerp Fashion Museum announced Sunday.
“Her name is inseparable from the legendary Antwerp Six, who put Belgian fashion on the world stage,” the museum stated.
In 1986, six young Flemish designers from the Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp loaded their creations into a van and drove to London to take part in the British Designer Show.
Because their names were nearly impossible to pronounce outside Belgium, Ann Demeulemeester, Dirk Van Saene, Marina Yee, Dries Van Noten, Walter Van Beirendonck, and Dirk Bikkembergs became known collectively as the Antwerp Six.
Their designs—minimal, raw, and deconstructed—stood in stark contrast to the glitter and padded shoulders that defined the fashion of the era.
Since then, the group’s members have followed different paths, from Marina Yee’s relative anonymity to the international acclaim of Dries Van Noten and Ann Demeulemeester, celebrated from Tokyo to New York. Dirk Bikkembergs, meanwhile, found his niche in sportswear, with his t-shirts and sneakers embraced by athletes.
Before Yee’s death from cancer, the Antwerp Fashion Museum had already planned an exhibition dedicated to the Antwerp Six in 2026 to mark the 40th anniversary of their international breakthrough.
With AFP
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