In the fashion world, Spring offers the perfect opportunity to bite the bullet, be brave with your colour choices, and inspire the weather to follow your lead. This Spring is certainly no different: the floral print trend dominated 90 percent of the Spring/Summer 2012 runways. Numerous designers – including Diane Von Furstenberg and Mary Katrantzou – have been flooding the catwalks with various eye popping prints, from pretty paisley and checks to the more abstract and unique.
To be backstage at Nicole Farhi is a beautiful thing. Getting a sneak peek and uber-close look at her Autumn/Winter 2012 collection was an absolute dream. With mustard, grey, and gold on the mind, Madame Farhi managed to balance the sensibly pristine with a dash of sequins. Minimal magic and new-age embellishments on classic pieced? Be still, my heart.
Though the models rocked pale foundation and blue lips, Bora Aksu’s collection was anything but frosty. The Turkish-born designer has a knack for taking fashion out of its comfort zone and displaying ornate detail on soft and feminine materials. This season gave a lot of white, pink, grey, and a whole lot of lace. A sensual juxtaposition of light and dark. If you love the idea of “Erdem meets Mary Katrantzou”, Aksu is your guy.
I was really surprised by Felder Felder this season. Known for their definitively dark presentations, the flaxen-haired duo gave us “Blonde” – a collection that appealed to a versatile, more contemporary buyer. The colours ranged from golds, to oranges, to impressively dark prints; dare I say there was a real Rodarte feel to the collection. This was a collection that any woman could create a capsule wardrobe from, and I am never one to complain about that. View Post
This week’s Outfit of The Week is inspired by the gorgeous Bunny Ring from Natasha Zinko (seen above). I love mixing playful elements with impeccable quality and design, so have thrown in the Isabel Marant Linka curly lambskin gilet over a multicolour floral print dress by Mary Katrantzou. Both items have been tied tight under a flower-appliquéd suede belt from Etro.
Because there is go much going on, the accessories need to be quite simple. In talons? The beige leather Nightingale from Givenchy. On toes? Metallic leather wedge sandals from Giuseppe Zanotti. Perfection.
Oh, Mary Mary, she seemed to be sick of everyone asking how her garden grows. Visual tools are the best answers, anyway. With an elongated bed of flowers in the centre of Miss Katrantzou’s Spring/Summer 2012 runway, the tone was set for an smart set of sartorial garden glory.
Glory, it was. I haven’t seen a designer use such involved precision in efforts to rewrite the linearity of a woman’s body for quite some time. Especially not like this. Her cuts are unusual in the most glamorous and distinctive way, letting her seamlessly follow body-conscious silhouettes with weightless trains. Like sophisticated, lavender, yellow, orange, green and pink birds of paradise. View Post
2010 Swiss Textiles Award winner Mary Katrantzou is imperative to your future fashion vocabulary. There was a welcome re-acquaintance with trompe l’oeil prints – an aspect from which things only further impressed. Built from the idea of a fabergé egg, every single print and shape was state-of-the-art, down to the Katrantzou-printed Louboutins. No-one else could construct a Swarovski encrusted skirt and make it look like a gem-covered pink flower garden of green jewels. With the addition of separates, her Fall/Winter 2011 offering was wearable without compromising the vanguard progression. See the top five looks below! View Post