In honour of Marina Yee

The texts were written following the death of Marina Yee on 1 November 2025 and compiled to mark the celebration of her life at our school, where she taught fashion from 2008 until 2023.

A year has now passed, and to mark the passing of, we have brought together the contributions from her colleagues and students into a single collection. It portrays her as the authentic visionary and intuitionist that she was.

Dearest Marina,

We are grateful for the opportunity to have been your students. You taught us that joy matters, and that from joy, new ideas can grow. You encouraged us to ask questions, to stay curious, and to look beyond what is obvious. You showed us the value of play and reminded us to follow our hearts.

Thank you, Marina,
for the fun costume parties,
for your drive and passion,
for the love you shared and offered, even when the road was tough,
for your support,
and for sharing your stories with us.
We carry your love and energy with us.
We will never forget what you taught us: together, we are stronger than alone.

Thank you, Marina
With love,
your students

• on behalf of her master’s students

How, then, can I describe you when so much has already been said?
As some people do?
Unconventional, headstrong,
the avant-gardist,
the outsider of that one group?
Enigmatic, intuitive,
young in spirit and old in soul,
the rebel, the free-thinker?
The most curious, the craziest?
The self-doubting, restless soul searching for her place,
(because, yes: sometimes that too)
sharp but always warm?
The artist and creator in everything she does,
a gatherer of the beauty found in small things?
(yes, that branch in the atelier is always hers)
A teacher of just be yourself,
a tireless supporter of young artistic talent
and a keen listener to the whispers of students’ hearts?
…. ?

Never mind all those names.
We call her Marina.
Just Marina. Our Marie.
When all is said and done, that says
everything to us.
With such gratitude for who you were and what you so generously did for us.
Rest in peace. We’ll cherish you forever.

• on behalf of her colleagues in fashion

Come on, Dirk, let’s turn this into a workspace. Could you bring my mannequin from home next time you come round? The room’s definitely big enough, isn’t it? It’s not exactly a 4-star hotel here, but more like an 8-star one (laughs). Whatever I ask for, the nurses just sort it out! Yes, it really does happen – even a foot massage. Say yes, and I’d also like one of our lamps from our PWO project in Japan here, it’ll make the place a bit cosier, give it more atmosphere. Come on, turn that biscuit tin you brought the other way… That looks better, don’t you think (laughs)? 

This was one of the many optimistic conversations that have stayed with me from my first visit to the palliative care unit in Mortsel. It was 16 October 2026, the second day after her transfer from the general hospital. Well, and here I was, thinking I’d end up in a sombre atmosphere. With Marina, of course, it was different again: positive, with her focus on fun and creativity. On my second visit, about 10 days later, I told Marina that we were going to sort out her workspace, the lamp and other things following the discussions at KASK. Together with my colleague Catherine, we reminisced about fashion, the children, the atmosphere at school, and so on. At the end, she said she was tired, but added:

Say, Dirk, one more thing – I’ve got a plan! They’re busy here planning my funeral, oh my… I certainly don’t want to be involved in that, for goodness’ sake. No, no, you know what, I’m going to throw a “Marina-isn’t-dead-yet party”, really. Yes… and I’m going to be there, with all the people who know me well. By the way, do come to my party with your wife and the children, it’s on Thursday 13 November 2025. You know what, we’re really going to make it a big party (laughs). We’ll meet some lovely people, all together.

OK, brilliant, I said, let’s plan it then, because it falls during the first week of the project – late afternoon into the evening? As always, a lovely, farewell kiss, a warm hug and a wave as we went our separate ways. That was the last glance we exchanged, a lasting memory of your big, sincere, enthusiastic smile. On 1 November 2025, a WhatsApp message arrived from your son Tzara saying that you had passed away peacefully…

An unexpected sense of sadness came over me. Our last six years at KASK & Conservatorium were a very intense collaboration, with highlights such as our trip to Berlin, the car journeys to the charity shops, the regular visits to each other’s homes, the wonderfully enjoyable creative working moments, the jokes over coffee, and the fun we shared with the whole family.

At school, Marina had an exceptionally non-conformist and playful approach as a teacher. It stimulated the students’ emotional sensitivity and their creative and inventive abilities. One example was the ‘Likes / Dislikes’ exercise she had developed: students had to collect around 40 images from magazines, newspapers, leaflets and so on in a very quick, intuitive manner. Whilst selecting them, there was just one question to ask: ‘Does this image move you (in either a positive or negative sense)?’ If so, place it on your blank sheet and carry on, photo by photo. These collages formed the basis for creative exploration, a way of arriving at the most authentic form of creation.

I feel grateful to have been able to share so much with her. Her innovative “What if…?” witticisms. Her upside-down, inside-out, backwards turning of views, images, designs, ways of doing things, and so on…

In 2010, we worked together on a 2- to 4-year research project in the arts and submitted it under the title The intuitively driven creative process in art education. It was not selected. Intuition and research… they are not always compatible within a scientific paradigm of research processes. In 2013, we travelled to Hong Kong together, alongside our colleague Bram Jespers, we delivered a workshop and a series of lectures on the theme of ‘Intuition-Driven Design in a Cross-Cultural Environment’ at the then DesignEd Asia Conference 2013.

We didn’t give up. In 2014, we submitted a new research project: Intuition Driven Design Experiences, ID2EE. The project aimed to develop a sustainable product development process centred on ‘empathic intelligent design’, but once again it was not selected.

Driven by our belief in these kinds of creative methods, Marina and I looked into the Project-based Scientific Research Projects at HOGENT and, in 2015, submitted the project Visionary Concepts for Fashion and Design. Here, too, there seemed to be little confidence in a research project driven by ‘intuition’, as it was deemed neither scientific nor measurable and therefore difficult to fit into a rational working, creative or research methodology.

At the University of Antwerp’s International Design Week in February 2016, we presented the ‘Likes / Dislikes’ exercise to the Faculty of Design Sciences. Together with around 15 product development students, we created designs based on what we felt when observing the material world around us. The irrational, the emotional and the artistic were given space. At the same time, our workshops also raised quite a few eyebrows.

Just follow your intuition! It’s incredible how little people make use of that special power. The whole of design education needs to change, because they really aren’t doing it right. It’s crucial whether or not you’re ‘moved’ by the first thing you see and feel. That sudden realisation, that ‘Ahh, yes!’ feeling.

It’s one of Marina’s many recurring statements. In 2015, she drew up a PhD proposal at KASK & Conservatorium on the theme of intuitive and emotional perception in design. She wanted to delve deeper. But unfortunately, after submission, the research proposal was not accepted. Well-thought-out teaching methods remained in place, and the project weeks bore all the fruits of this approach.

It was not until 2016 that the PWO project was approved under the title ‘Interaction Design’, a design case study of seating furniture for lifelong use. Following the collaboration, this resulted in the book Relational Design, an emotional bond as a catalyst for sustainability.

It also marked the start of a three-year research project in which all the values and criteria that Marina held so dear were given the recognition they deserved. The exhibition Inspire ALL – Connected BY, held in 2019 in the Zwarte Zaal at KASK & Conservatorium, showcased all kinds of ‘damaged goods’ that had been brought together to create new designs for furniture and interior objects. This was followed in the same year by the practice-oriented research project Japanese-Kanazawa’s folding and assembly techniques as a source of knowledge for designing sustainable furniture and interiors. Together, we created a collection of lamps, seating furniture and folded fabrics, which we exhibited again in 2022. After that, Marina left to take her retirement.

It is now 2026. I have just boarded the same train from Antwerp to Ostend – the train we shared for more than six years. Always the first carriage, the place where we started the day after I boarded at Antwerp-South. Marina taught me to have faith in ‘broken’ and ‘damaged’ pieces. Their energy can come to life again – but in a different way – through the care and attention you give them. She taught me to take my time to interpret things through feeling, to be able to sense, as Marina always said.

Perhaps we should sense ahead more together, and try to surround our community with greater care, based on that attitude? I think we need this.

• Dirk Van Gogh, design and interior design colleague

To speak of Marina is to speak of a rare, quiet brilliance—one that never demanded attention, yet deeply shaped everyone fortunate enough to cross her path. Her spirit still feels so alive that her absence remains difficult to comprehend. She taught with a gentleness that never softened her conviction, and with a wisdom that rose far beyond craft alone. In her presence, creativity felt sacred, an inner landscape she encouraged us to explore with courage, curiosity, and tenderness. Marina saw the world not as it is, but as it could be—rebellious, poetic, and full of possibility—and she guided us not only in fashion, but in how to look, how to feel, and how to honour the quiet power of authenticity. Though she is no longer here, her presence has not dimmed: it lives in the memories we share, in the imagination she opened in us, and in every moment we choose intuition over convention, honesty over spectacle, and kindness over ego. For all she gave, I am profoundly grateful.

My deep condolences, support and love to all

•  Jaimy-Aris D’hont, student fashion

Hi Marina,

We first met a good 20 years ago now, give or take. To welcome you, we went for dinner at a lovely little restaurant in Ghent, along with a few colleagues from KASK & Conservatorium. I sat next to you during that dinner. And the rest is history! It was a blast right from the start. I was excited. Such a famous name. I remembered the fashion magazines from the 1980s, when I was a young teenager, and the stories they featured about the breakthrough of The Antwerp Six in the international fashion world. Years later, I was working at MoMu in Antwerp, following academic wanderings in the USA and not too long before taking up the post at KASK. And now I was sitting next to you, and within five minutes we were already laughing together. You quickly sensed that I wasn’t just another star-chaser, and you also found my research fascinating. It was mutual, the way we clicked. We worked together for about 16 years – I’ve lost track of the exact dates, life goes by too fast, as the cliché goes. Together we trained generations of students, alongside Liesbeth, Eva and many other colleagues: you from a practical perspective, me from a theoretical one, but with a firm footing in the Studio. It was a true labour of love, seeing those young people lay their souls bare in their work … what an incredible privilege that we were able to experience this together for so many years, that we were able to assist them in this, that we listened, advised, guided – loosely or a little less loosely, depending on the needs of the student sitting before us – intuitively sensed their needs and supported them.

You always followed my path closely during our years together at KASK, and you shared in all my travels and, yes, sometimes my tribulations too. The periods of long-term ethnographic fieldwork I undertook in Vanuatu, the PhD thesis I wrote based on that whilst affiliated with both KASK and the University of Melbourne. Years later, I was still juggling various jobs, until a few years ago I plucked up the courage and handed in my resignation at KASK & Conservatorim. At the time, I was working full-time at Leiden University, whilst still keeping one foot in Ghent University and at KASK. You were sorry to see me go, but you understood, and a year later you retired yourself. We walked the catwalk one last time together with Eva and Liesbeth in the final of the KASK fashion show, knowing it would be the last time we’d do this together. It still sounds strange, ‘you retiring’ … with your young heart and soul. Avant-gardist. Trailblazer. You soon fell ill. That terrible illness. It happened quickly, and you passed away not long after. You’d wanted to throw a party, with chips, champagne and chocolates. But you didn’t make it in time. So we ended up holding that party ourselves at KASK, in a private gathering, in a sombre mood. I’d actually been away from there for a while by then, but I was happy to be back on board with our former colleagues and friends, in fashion and beyond, to celebrate you. We tried to laugh at that party, just as you would have wanted, but we also shed a few tears and shared plenty of hugs.

The newspapers, social media and the news went into overdrive the day after your death. The fashion journalists were quick off the mark with their analyses of you and your career. Many of those analyses were cringe-worthy. I remember how disillusioned I was by those descriptions claiming that you’d been – what was it all about? – stubborn, or that you’d lacked business acumen, and that you’d therefore never really made your mark in fashion like the other Five of the Six. Fortunately, there were also some lovely articles and other pieces that honoured you as the trailblazer you truly were. That you never betrayed your ideals. That you had deliberately chosen not to go commercial, on principle, because you did not support the system of fashion and commerce, the many abuses in the fashion sector, waste, and so on. And that, above all, you were – and still are – first and foremost a visual artist, rather than a fashion designer in the strict sense of the word. You hadn’t been back in the fashion business for very long, you were taking your first tentative steps. I still remember how we set up that shop window in Paris together, with your new work, with Eva there too, laughing until our sides ached. You still never compromised on your vision, on how you viewed sustainability – ever since the 1980s, and right up to the present day. Since your retirement, your creative output had gained fresh momentum, partly thanks to your sparring partner Rafael Adriaansens: Marina was back in the picture, and that was so incredibly well-deserved. You just managed to witness the start of that renewed attention, including for your visual art, and you knew it would all work out. Because it can’t have been easy: for decades you weren’t mentioned in the list of ‘The Six’, and your name was often replaced by ‘No. 7’ of ‘The Six’, Martin Margiela, with whom you’d shared so many joys and sorrows – we could all sense that. You didn’t let any of it get to you too much – or so you said, at any rate. But surely it must have ‘got to you’ at some point? It’s almost impossible not to, dearest Marie? And yet you always spoke lovingly and respectfully of your old classmates and schoolmates, and of Sonja Noël from De Stijl in Brussels, and of so many others… What a beautiful woman you were, are and always will be, inside and out. We’ll carry you with us forever.

• Hugo DeBlock, colleague

In a room where pencil lines touched upon what words could not express, you brought us back to the essence: seeing, feeling, daring, and starting from there. As a teacher, you gave us more than just technique and form. You gave us freedom, a world without boundaries, where every line became a possibility. You taught us to let go, not to be afraid of a blank sheet of paper, to draw as we thought, and to think as we dreamt.

With every sketch, you unlocked a part of ourselves we hadn’t yet discovered, and under your gentle guidance we found the room to truly create. You saw beauty in the unexpected, in the imperfect, in the freedom of a line that ran just a little differently and was, precisely because of that, perfect.

Marina, thank you for the light you brought into our hands and minds, for the freedom you gave us, for the warmth with which you guided us. You live on in every line we draw, in every thought we dare to follow. You will be missed, but now there’s an extra bright star shining in the sky. Turn it upside down up there & be the star that you are!

Love, Jessica Francesca Van Winckel <3

• student mode

4 November 2025

Last Wednesday, I popped in to see Marina in Mortsel.
I arrived at about three o’clock.

At the reception, I asked for Marina, the nurse said: ‘Palliative care, at the very end, first floor.’ That’s when it really hit me.

I knocked.
‘Come in,’ she said, clear and warm as ever.

She was sitting upright in bed, her eyes beautifully made up.
Fifteen minutes to go before the nurse came to fetch her for a bath.

She talked about her illness, about the diagnosis nearly a year ago, just after she’d retired.

She asked about fashion, about you all, and whether the news had gone down well.
She spoke of students who’d been to visit,
how much she loved teaching, how close she was to them.

She was lively. Present.

She still wanted to throw a party.
An ‘I’m still here’ party.

Her in the centre, in her bed.
Friends around her, having a natter.

Candles perhaps, chips for sure, chocolates too, and champagne.
Everything had been thought through, even how to ensure no bits of paper or rubbish would be left behind.
Typical Marina.

The venue had already been sorted.

‘I’d rather die in the company of a few close friends,’ she said.

She spoke of drawing, of going home, her cats, collecting her belongings.
As if there were still time.
Or as if time worked differently.

A little later, Dirk, a colleague at KASK, came in with freshly baked biscuits.

She asked about the lamp that had been created as part of a research project with Dirk,
and whether it could go to Tzara, her son. He would sort it out.

It felt both light and surreal.
The same voice, the same gentleness, in a different room.

When it was time for her bath, she said we could wait.
But we left.
Short visits, she said, that was better.

I thought of the journeys back to Antwerp, after the jury sessions and the graduation shows.
I enjoyed playing the chauffeur at those times.

On Saturday, the news came that Marina had gently slipped away –
like a white butterfly, in early November,
who would have liked to stay a little longer.

At KASK, we gathered at the end of November – around the time she’d wanted to hold her ‘I’m still here’ party – together with a dozen or so colleagues.
We drank champagne, talked, wrote, shared.
We captured something of her and of us in words and drawings.
For her son, and now for you too.

What remains is beautiful.

Something in the way she looked at things.
Of working.

Inside out. Backwards.
Until it felt right, in a different way.

A fresh perspective.
Beautiful compositions, slightly shifted.

Something light, too.
And stubborn.

We’re still in for those chips.

Love,
Catherine

•  Catherine Willems, fashion colleague

This text is a shortened version of what I wrote after visiting Marina a week before her passing, following years of working with her, organising project weeks and arranging fashion trips to Paris with colleagues. The text takes as its starting point my last meeting with her, but forms part of a longer period of collaboration within the fashion department at KASK & Conservatorium.

Dear Marina,

I just wanted to let you know that you meant the world to me and so many other students. Not only through your assignments, which shaped and supported our artistic development, but also on a personal level. I’ve always found your strength and intuition incredibly inspiring. I’ll carry that with me.

I’m so glad I had the chance to be taught by you, that we were part of each other’s lives for a while, in each other’s homes and worlds. From the speed assignments to writing affirmations, from your way of seeing and feeling, to your support… I’m so grateful for everything you’ve given me.

Lots of love! I wish you all the warmth, gentleness and strength.

•  Elisabeth Claes, fashion student

Dearest Marina,

• Hannah Van Spauwen, student