FASHION: Marina Yee has left Antwerp Six for good

Designer Marina Yee was born in 1958 in Antwerp (Belgium) and passed away on November 1st at the age of 67.

She entered the prestigious Royal Academy of Fine Arts in Antwerp to study fashion and completed her studies in the early 1980s. She was part of the first generation of Belgian designers, each very different from the others, who would break free from the narrow confines of the Low Countries and quickly shake up the codes of European fashion.

Although this association was initially almost accidental (to allow them to stage a joint fashion show in London), Marina Yee is indeed one of the founding members of Antwerp Six. This collective of six young Flemish designers, all graduates of the city's Academy of Fine Arts, included Dries Van Noten, Ann Demeulemeester, Dirk Bikkembergs, Dirk Van Saene, and Walter Van Beirendonck. Marina has always been the most discreet member of the group, to the point that Martin Margiela is often cited as the famous sixth member. Wrongly, of course… Long before upcycling became a buzzword, the designer's work was already characterized not only by a minimalist aesthetic and meticulous craftsmanship but also by a desire to achieve "zero waste." In the early 2000s, in her tiny boutique-workshop in the center of Brussels, she was already inviting women to bring her their favorite outfits to give them a new life. She explained in "Business of Fashion" at the time: "I've always appreciated simplicity in fashion because it's one of the hardest things to achieve. You have to be able to eliminate everything superfluous."

She is the only one of the Six who has never walked the Parisian runways and has never been concerned with the sacrosanct seasons. Without sacrificing comfort and wearability, she prefers to constantly question form and material, sometimes incorporating secondhand clothing or reclaimed fabrics. A “reconstruction” of fashion with the patience of an alchemist, rather than a creation ex nihilo (or one supposedly created from scratch).

Like Dirk Van Saene and Walter Van Beirendonck in Antwerp, she also taught fashion at the KABK in The Hague and the KASK in Ghent.

Always quietly, almost on tiptoe, Marina Yee passed away on November 1st after a long battle with cancer. In 2026, an exhibition will retrace the epic story of the Antwerp Six at MOMU, the fashion museum in her hometown. Ann, Dries, Dirk B, Walter, and Dirk VS will feel orphaned there…

(MH with Stéphane Soupart - Photo : © Etienne Tordoir)

Photo: Portrait of Marina Yee at the “Stijl” boutique in Brussels (Belgium) in 1990