For Bella Matarese, the sea has always represented something larger than a landscape. Growing up two minutes from the ocean in Rhode Island and later living on a sailboat, she developed an intimate relationship with the water, one shaped by freedom, curiosity, and a fascination with the world existing just beneath its surface. Those experiences became the foundation for her senior collection, The Water Becomes Me, a surreal exploration of what happens when the pursuit of happiness becomes a pursuit without an end.
The collection began unexpectedly, through textile experimentation. While researching ideas for her senior collection, Matarese found herself repeatedly working on a spiral-motif cording technique. Hours spent manipulating the material left her in what she describes as a state of “delusion,” where she lost her sense of time and space. The spiraling shape began to resemble the patterns found on sailing charts, transporting her back to her time on the water.
From there, a story began to emerge.
Matarese created a muse whose lifelong ambition is to sail across the world alone. As the woman travels farther into the ocean, however, her sense of reality begins to dissolve. Her charts shift, the ocean begins to speak, and the boundaries between herself and her surroundings disappear. Eventually, “the water becomes her.”
At the center of the narrative is an idea that extends far beyond sailing: the human tendency to constantly chase what comes next. Matarese connects the muse’s journey to her own experience at fashion school, where achieving a long-held dream did not necessarily mean arriving at the sense of fulfillment she expected.
“I always want my work to say something,” she explains. Rather than making the collection entirely autobiographical, she wanted to begin with something personal and transform it into a story that could be shared. The pursuit of happiness, in her view, is something many people understand—the feeling of reaching for a larger goal while potentially overlooking the journey that leads there.
That relationship between the personal and the universal is reflected throughout the collection’s materials. Sailing culture is deeply connected to Matarese’s upbringing, and nautical references became central to the project without being treated literally. She sourced recycled materials from the sailboat she lived on, as well as from sailing companies around New England. The captain of her former boat gave her an old mainsail, which she transformed into a skirt, while the rope incorporated throughout the collection also came from the boat.
She additionally collaborated with Sea Bags Maine to source materials, bringing her wider New England community into the making of the collection. For Matarese, that support became an important part of the creative process itself.
The maritime influence continues through the silhouettes. Rather than reproducing traditional sailor clothing, Matarese looked toward vintage and historical uniforms, including old life jackets, waders, and utilitarian outerwear. She collaged these references with contemporary fashion imagery, cutting apart existing forms and combining them in unexpected ways.
“I wasn’t starting with a traditional fashion silhouette,” she says. “I was building something new by combining and distorting things that already existed.”
The resulting garments are intentionally oversized, heavy, and at times overwhelming. The clothing becomes an extension of the muse’s psychological state, gradually consuming the body as she becomes increasingly consumed by the sea. Pieces such as the rope top are designed to feel as though the environment has completely engulfed her.
Color and print further develop this surreal underwater world. One of Matarese’s favorite memories of living on the boat was sitting on deck at night and watching tiny points of bioluminescent light flicker across the water. She imagined her muse experiencing the same phenomenon as her perception of reality began to shift.
To translate that memory into textile, Matarese created an original print beginning with watercolor blooms on paper. She then digitally engineered the artwork and developed a range of blues designed to make the print feel both vivid and approachable. Within the story of the collection, the print becomes a visual representation of the ocean as the muse sees it: increasingly beautiful, surreal, and detached from reality.
Although the collection draws heavily from traditionally masculine maritime clothing, Matarese’s perspective remains firmly rooted in womenswear. She balances sharp, commanding shapes with softer feminine elements, inspired by designers such as KHAITE and Altuzarra. Her ideal customer is, in her words, a “badass woman” who can appreciate color and funk alongside class and elegance.
That duality—strength and softness, control and surrender—runs through the collection.
The process of creating it was far from effortless. One of Matarese’s most challenging pieces was a large striped wrap jacket, which required four attempts to perfect. The experience taught her about understructure, construction, and the tiny adjustments necessary to make a garment appear effortless on the body.
Perhaps most importantly, The Water Becomes Me taught Matarese something about herself. Over the nine months of developing the collection, she discovered a design voice she had not yet recognized: one rooted in strong storytelling, unusual materials, color, and the relationship between environment and body.
Today, Matarese is continuing that exploration in New York, where she works on the Material Development team at KHAITE. For now, she is focused on learning, experimenting, and remaining open to whatever comes next.
It is a fitting place to arrive after creating a collection about the dangers of endlessly chasing the next destination. The Water Becomes Me ultimately suggests that there may be value in surrendering the need to know exactly where the journey ends. As Matarese puts it, the collection taught her to “stay curious, enjoy the journey, and allow the next thing to reveal itself.”
