The Versace woman unleashed in the urban jungle. Masculine tailoring is feminised by a darted, elegantly sculptured waist, while utility jackets are the new daywear essential. Toughened luxury comes from a laminated boucle jacket with fringed edges of silk chiffon, or the raw edges of a pencil skirt with a thigh high split.
Energised animal prints clash and contrast with the attitude of the street, with acid leopard and zebra prints often combined in the same look. Sportswear is everything, like the poloshirts and sweatshirts in animal print jacquard knit, or the zip-up blousons in acid leopard.
Craftsmanship adds rich detail, like a suede zip-up jacket bonded and topstitched with animal prints, or a utility jacket richly embellished with sequins. Fil coupe animal print dresses are tied as if spontaneously at the shoulder and hip, while lace gives the effect of animal print against the skin.
A new pinstripe appears and fades as if it pulses, on a tailored jacket tied at the waist, or a slashed front dress that’s tied at the shoulder and edge. Flowing gowns of animal print silk chiffon are raw edged, and are tied as they go down the body to the floor.
Platform heels with a rubberised sole are fastened with safety buckles, while platform sandals come embellished with sequins and frayed chiffon. Selected bags from the show, including sequin embellished backpacks and tie-handle bags from the Palazzo family, will be available in select Versace flagships and e-commerce next week.
The music of the show starts with the track Transition by Violet and friends, made for Equality Now, to which Versace is making a donation. “This is a collection for the way women live their lives today, mixing tailoring with sportswear and effortless glamour.” Donatella Versace
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Tags: SPRING SUMMER WOMEN 2016, VERSACE, VERSACE SS 2016
Sun, January 24 2016 » Fashion Blog
An evolution, a reimagining, a change. In his first collection as creative director of Roberto Cavalli, Peter Dundas goes back to the label’s fundamental elements – its essence – in order to define the new Roberto Cavalli woman of today.
Drawing on his heritage of work, as well as his own past as a storied member of the Cavalli team, Peter Dundas reinvigorates and revives the codes of the house, mixing them together into a dynamic and youthful new proposition. Fresh, wilful, and free: all hallmarks of the Roberto Cavalli woman.
Freedom – of body and of inspiration – is key. Dundas draws on Roberto Cavalli’s excellence in denim, leather and exuberant Florentine hand-craftsmanship to create a wardrobe that eschews notions of the precious, of day and night, in favour of a free mix of garments.
Ball skirts combine with sweatshirts, denim jackets are embroidered with craftsmanship traditionally reserved for evening. Silhouettes contrast between body-conscious and easy, the rapport with the body a vital element.
Baroque and minimal, familiar and new. Boundaries are blurred and ultimately redefined. The pegasus, a mythological symbol of freedom, is the collection’s central motif, ideologically and aesthetically, recurring in prints, jacquards and jewelry.
Print merge from tie-dye to animal demarkations and camou age, to “big cat prints” rethought as a lion’s face worked into brocades and jacquard knits. A burnt-out pattern in suede creates a dancing chiaroscuro of leopard print on the bare skin.
The natural world is the inspiration for all of this, and for the colour palette, of terracotta, brilliant limoncello, a washed Aegean turquoise and a palette of neutrals – including denim blue, the new neutral of the twenty- first century.
The collection is an homage to the technical possibilities of the Roberto Cavalli ateliers, not only in traditional atelier crafts – embroidered chains and chain-mail, tuffetage, or beading on tulle, used to create mirages of fabric through pure technique – but in more modern approaches.
Leather is washed to a velvet softness, silk taffeta tie-dyed, denim washed and treated. Those approaches and fabrics are juxtaposed continually, day and night, leather with silk, chiffon with denim, the contrasts proposing a fresh language for luxury. A freedom.
Taking couture back to the street, everything is precious, bar the attitude. This collection is an homage to the Roberto Cavalli woman – past, present and beyond.
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Tags: Roberto Cavalli, ROBERTO CAVALLI SS 2016, SPRING SUMMER WOMEN 2016
Fri, January 22 2016 » Fashion Blog
A sense of languor pervades the new Jil Sander collection.
The precision and clarity the house is known for are seen from another perspective. As filtered through a lens in soft focus, the straight cuts and commanding purism gain a dryly romantic suppleness, a dreamy nonchalance and a suffused sensuality.
Broken by folds, knots and torsions that create an overall feel of sophisticated precariousness, the silhouette has a vertical ease. Plays of slashes and cut-outs redesign the tailored jacket, offering graphic glimpses of what is underneath.
Fluid satin dresses move around the body with a liquid ease. Impalpable lingerie hints run throughout: pantsuits have the slouch of a pajama, draped dresses coil around the bust like superimposed camisoles.
A twisted nappa dress looks both frail and dangerous. The bias cut is featured profusely, creating diagonal movements and floating forms. Sashes are tied onto dresses, suggesting the spontaneous gesture of knotting.
The languid aura is offset by a series of leather pieces of firm yet painterly precision: to-the-knee coats are closed at the waist with vinyl tubes; halters are studded onto slip dresses, creating an engaging play of contrasting, layered textures. The printed leather coat has an offbeat metropolitan hardness.
The color palette is delicate and pale. Tones of white, light blue, sand and charcoal are accented with notes of rust and deep blue. Materials are sensual to the touch: silk satin, washed jacquard silk, silk duchesse, plongée leather.
Accessories are folded straw hats, shoes with graphic buckle motifs, pendant earrings.
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Tags: JIL SANDER, JIL SANDER SS 2016, SPRING SUMMER WOMEN 2016
Fri, January 22 2016 » Fashion Blog
CONTRAST IMAGES
Levity, joy, carnality, passion, sensuousness. An unbound expression of imagination results in a totally fresh take on nonchalance, complete with a greater sense of awareness and very much of an edgy allure. In no way casual or off-hand. Quite the contrary, reflecting every woman’s unique and individual will.
Drawing upon influences from and re-elaborations of shots by Corinne Day (photographer who documented the forces and impulses of the ‘90s) and by the beautiful, eccentric Tina Modotti (who upset and nullified Latin American folk concepts with her Leica), Alessandro Dell’Acqua gives definition to the No. 21 spring-summer 2016 collection by making use of a creative process performed in a dark room where the images are inverted, overlapped and reworked through a concept of fashion coming forth as a tool for interpreting modern life.
It’s an unusual and coherent collection at once offering surprising twists & turns and confirming the signature style of a designer who, in pursuit of an exquisitely contemporary aesthetic, is always open to a re-evaluation of objectives.
So the ever favorite masculine/feminine mix finds strong renewal in the T-shirts worn under chiffon slip-dresses or lovely lace frocks, in the caban with passementerie and pom-pom trim, in the cady dresses with reams of ruffles plus pairing with a white shirt, in the textural contrast between coarse linen skirt and smooth crepe de chine blouse, in the deconstructed shirt draped dress.
Echoing this theme is a new sensuality that comes through in the macramé dresses in soft pastel shades, in the crepe pinafore, in the cotton lace dresses with chantilly lace overlay, in the floral print pajama-suits or floral skirt suit with upholstery passementerie edging, and in the sensually draped melange knit dresses.
All interconnects in the poplin jumpsuits ending in a top where folk-style embroidery takes on a smart Victorian slant; and also in the cupro outfits, in the tank tops and skirts made with strips of python leather, and in the graceful shoes presenting tribal-type decors and pretty pom-poms while at the same time uniting quite seriously with plain cotton kneesocks and/or with elongated severity-elegance totes.
These overlapping images of today’s many forms of femininity are framed with discreet strass tiaras that playfully vanish when they turn into sunglasses featuring ultra novel shapes and volumes all while entrusting the sparkle of eyes to the chromatic glints of the metal inserts of lenses.
So becoming metaphors for the lenses that Alessandro Dell’Acqua utilized to filter the images appropriated by his own life vision and experience and that in this No. 21 collection he transformed into seductive contrasts between emotions instrumental in writing original stories.
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Tags: N°21, N°21 SS 2016, SPRING SUMMER WOMEN 2016
Fri, January 22 2016 » Fashion Blog
Blocks of horizontal, vertical, diagonal and zigzag stripes lightly ripple knits, crepon and silk, with openwork, reliefs and canneté, transforming the Missoni Summer 2016 collection into a full immersion of color, graphic lines into a pictorial patchwork.
Wide kick pants but also slim, tailored trousers. Fluid silhouettes with long or knee-length dresses in straight or A- line are edged with overlaid polychrome stripes, open or in relief, that enhance and embellish the necklines like tribal ornaments.
Unusual shades ranging from bright red to orange and yellow, from pink to lilac, from bright green to mustard and from ultramarine to teal sit side by side with white, dove grey, brown and black.
Long scarves are crossed over the chest and knotted at the back to become cosy shrugs over dresses. Sandal booties, as flat as socks, have uppers composed of open stripes of multicolor calfskin.
There are sandals with double criss-cross bands and platforms with two-tone stripes. These are alternated with Exclusive Converse All-Stars in striped and zigzag Missoni fabric.
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Tags: MISSONI, MISSONI SS 2016, SPRING SUMMER WOMEN 2016
Fri, January 22 2016 » Fashion Blog
Thu, January 21 2016 » Fashion Blog
Thu, January 21 2016 » Fashion Blog
My appointment as creative director of Iceberg surprised and thrilled me. For my debut I decided to start from this brand’s most authentic DNA: knitwear, element comprising more than 80% of the new spring-summer 2016 Iceberg collection.
Working alongside artisans is a continual discovery: the transition from idea to reality has never come so natural to me. Above all, the very technique, the know-how have become a source of inspiration.
I took my place face to face with the 40 years of Iceberg history with a keen sense of curiosity and a wish for great fun. I felt as if I were stepping outside the radar of my own plan of action so as to bring what I know and what I like into a new and interesting territory.
The army aesthetic and a sport type of cut, both intrinsic to the Iceberg style, were the incipit of my story. To these I added a streak of madness, a playful spirit drawing upon the multicolor creativity and the sense of humor of Enrico Baj, an Italian artist I admire for his carefree concept of anarchy.
My intent is to give shape – through clothing – to the idea of freshness and energy emblematic of today’s world. With Iceberg I’d like to build an easy wardrobe at once cosmopolitan, irreverent and sensual. Knit fabric, in the role of raw material, is perfect for fulfilling this task.
It’s a narrative tool able to capture and express the urge to break the rules all while staying true to tradition. Finally, there’s my love for sharp graphics and for its opposite, disorderliness.
Jacquard and vinyl. Straight lines and soft lines. Optical designs and flat surfaces. In looking at the collection what comes to my mind is a melodic score out of rhythm in a few spots.
It mirrors my aesthetic: rigor and anarchy, a counterpoint that leads me to stretch the style to its limits. Then stop and glance backward, with levity.
Arthur Arbesser
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Tags: ICEBERG, ICEBERG SS 2016, SPRING SUMMER WOMEN 2016
Thu, January 21 2016 » Fashion Blog
Wed, January 20 2016 » Fashion Blog
Tue, January 19 2016 » Fashion Blog
