“Neutral / opposite of black / “carte blanche”. In addition to optical white, the whole range of whites. Principal colour used for all boutiques and studios. Even for painting on certain clothes.”

This definition of white from the Maison Martin Margiela barely begins to encompass its significance as a keystone of the house’s philosophy since its inception in a white walled and curtained room in Paris in 1989.

Throughout A#1, Margiela has compiled an eclectic blend of white inspirations, inserted between external collaborations offering the essence of tainted purity and tongue-in-cheek humour of the house.

The series begins with the image of a cluttered living room – a white rabbit peeking from under a coffee table laden with white crockery and cups as a pair of stocking-clad legs reclines lazily [speaking on a telephone] in a white leather sofa. The adjacent page features a dictionary excerpt of definitions for ‘white’ and it’s various forms, from ‘whited sepulchre’ to ‘bleed white’.

Other white objects:

- an albino Minnie Mouse stuffed doll,

- a traditional french recipe found by Kanako B. Koga for blanquette au sucre blanc (suggesting that it be served on a table of white wood with a white table cloth!),

- A Pop-art graphic of  a white chocolate praline from one of Belgium’s finest chocolate stores, Leonidas.

- A whimsically iced, tiered and decadently decorated wedding cake from Wittamer, shot by Lucien Krauss.

Finally the sterile, pedestrian images of a packet of cotton swabs and a five-socket power cord extender – utilitarian and everyday objects that contrast with the frivolous confectionery above, that altogether when spaced through the magazine paint a disconcerting picture, and form an early basis for Margiela’s white objects.