Modern Fashion Design Applied Korean Traditional Patchwork Style

International competiveness is an important assignment in this global age. Developing values for each countries and from their culture respectively, is a powerful measure to compete in this time. Fashion design is a high value-added vehicle to carry through the culture in this environment. Therefore, development of designs that reflect the cultural beauty of that tradition, is rising as an important method for gaining competiveness.In the fashion design world, designs that reflect the unique characteristic of a specific cultural image and form are being highlighted-traditional clothing styles such as China’s Qi pao and Japan’s Kimono became sources of many ideas. Japanese designers at Europe, such as Kenzo and Issay Miyake, founded their national identify in this global world by developing a design unique to Japan. This study suggests a way and to contribute in creating a competitive design by elaborating on the Korean traditional patchwork style, and applying it to the modern design to combine uniqueness and creativityThe methodology of this study is literature research and substantive data analysis. As a theoretical research, definition, origin, meaning and application of patchwork was considered. Also, its aesthetic was analyzed, and was compared to the modern abstractive paintings. Cases where Korean patchwork was applied from mid 90s till recent were collected from magazines, fashion websites and designer’s collections, then the trend was analyzed. Lastly, three design works were created by combining the Korean traditional patchwork style that has been researched and analyzed in this study, with the Korean traditional female clothing style.The design basis was to recreate the Jo Gak Bo (patch-worked wrapping cloth) and Saek Dong (cloth with stripes of many colors), where patchwork was used, in a modern image, but having their traditional shape preserved. The concept was to articulate Korean, but refined image, with the colors also refining with the use of modern image colors. The design motif was to show the traditional and geometrical beauty by using Jo Gak Bo that articulated the abstractive figure by patched cloths. In addition, by reinterpreting the plane construction of the Saek Dong, a design to suite the modern females was attempted.It is not the very first attempt of high fashion to take a minorities clothing style as the source of inspiration. It goes all the way back to the Rococo for the Chinese and impressionism era where the term ’Japonism’ was created for the Japanese. To talk of Korean fashion, the Korean motifs must go through the process of be dissection and variation as a high fashion motif and this is a time consuming process. With this study, attempts to systematically study the Korean traditional style to identify the characteristics of its beauty, and to fuse it to the modern fashion will be made, thus will contribute to in modernizing globalizing the Korean traditional style.