While scores of stiletto heels will descend upon New York City tomorrow afternoon as Fashion Week hits the city for the first time this decade, "Quicktake: Rodarte," a soon-to-debut exhibition at the Cooper-Hewitt, National Design Museum, will offer something significantly removed from the commercially driven runways: a fashion exhibition structured around the theme of destruction.

In an industry plagued by homogeneity and nostalgia, fashion designers Laura and Kate Mulleavy, of the Pasadena, California-based brand Rodarte, are a breath of fresh air. "They're fearless," says "Quicktake" curator Gregory Krum of the sisters. (The relatively new series "Quicktake" presents compact shows highlighting very contemporary or emergent designers). "A lot of American designers are either working in a modernist way or a conceptual way, but Rodarte is right outside of both of those schools of thought," Krum adds about the designers, who were finalists for the Cooper Hewitt Museum's National Design Award in 2009.

Daughters of a fine artist and a botanist and raised in rural northern California, the Mulleavys consistently bring forth simultaneous references to the natural world and the apocalyptic in their designs. Their sartorial language is rooted in highly textural fabrics and punctuated with techniques like burning, fraying, sand papering, and delicate dying. Influences range from Gordon Matta Clark's works and obscure horror films, to the construction and taking apart of homes depending on the collection. "It's almost a collage effect," notes Krum of the Mulleavy's style, "it's very additive — they are engaging cultural issues very far outside what normal fashion designers are doing."

The 18-look strong exhibit is organized into three platforms separated by color, and includes pieces from previous and varying collections. Although the works on display span Rodarte's repertoire, this is by no means a retrospective... yet. "Everything is completely on their own terms — they have no investors," says Krum. "If they need to get something done, they'll invent something new and figure it out." In other words, perhaps a future retrospective may not be too far off.