September 16, 2016 |
Yesterday may have officially marked the beginning of London Fashion Week, but it also officially marks the end of New York Fashion Week. And what a week it’s been. Fashions as far as the eye can see. Fashions that don’t cause you to shriek with terror and avert your eyes, but ones that order your gaze to linger a little longer than might be considered polite. No one wants to be confused with that weirdo on the tube who with one look, held for one second longer than necessary crosses that fine line between friendly and weirdo. Sometimes it just can’t be helped though. So without further ado, allow us to present out NYFW SS17 highlights.
When it comes to Pornhub highlights, changing the P in their logo to Prince’s symbol was the pinnacle. How do you follow that. No amount of Dikachu spinoffs could ever usurp it. And then comes along Hood by Air who not only collaborates with them on a film but liberally sprinkles their logo, the non Prince mourning logo over caps and, rather fittingly, underwear. Which, when combined with that double footed shoe (a modern update on the beast with two backs?) and the slick, gel covered heads does suggest certain things to people inclined to think of these things in a certain way. And what of the clothes? They were great, we’ve already written about them. Look it up. It’s what search bars were invented for.
You’ll have noticed over the past few seasons that, rather stealthily, like a panther waiting to pounce on it’s prey, well okay, maybe not, but Proenza Schouler have set about establishing what we will term a signature silhouette. And what a silhouette. Long and lean, with an ever so slightly higher waist and finished off with a kicky hem. This time it came in handkerchief form, exploding from the waist down, in asymmetric layers of monochrome colour blocks with a dash of red thrown in for good measure. Imagine a Cubist flamenco dancer and you’d be on the right track. Or a Lego flamenco dancer, but with fewer sharp corners. You get the general jist.
There was a weird sloth type aesthetic to Alexander Wang’s latest collection. A sort stoner, woke up like this, rolled out the house like this. The best way to describe it? The love Child of The Big Lebowski’s the Dude, and Bridget Fonda in Jackie Brown if that makes any sense at all. It’s a paired back collection of, for want of a better phrase, deconstructed basics. Essentially, an essay in shirting, from shirts and triangle bikini tops to lace trimmed boxers that have a sportswear quality to them, with elasticated straps that criss cross the torso. Think lady boxer in repose and you’ll be on the right track.
There was something very Grace Jones about the first exit at DKNY. The tightness of that dress, the slash of cleavage, the hood over the head… Slave to the Rhythm, or rather slave to the future? Well Maxwell Osborne and Dao-Yi Chow did say that they wanted to look to the future, or to sort of quote them, they had an idea of something they called ‘Neo Soho’ in their heads. A futuristic back to the future. Think of it as a look back at the archives of DKNY in order to reimagine their groundbreaking leisure wear concept for a new audience. A sort of second coming if you will. And who doesn’t love a second coming?
If the SS17 Coach collection was a song, it would be a Tom Petty song, not because the collection necessarily reminded us of Tom Petty, even though it was about an American girl, and Tom has sung of an American Girl, more than once probably, but because of something Stuart Vevers, the Creative Director said to us backstage. “I pictured the Coach girl in the Southwest, loves Elvis, wears her Sunday best with a rebellious Rockabilly sensibility.” It sounds surprisingly, well probably only to us, to Tom’s Free Falling, because she was crazy about Elvis in that, and also had a thing for the land of the free. So what does a Tom Petty collection look like? A punked-up rockabilly rebel. Think flouncy dresses in sheer, dark florals with a bad girl leather thrown over the top.
How do you follow up a successful debut. With an even more successful sequel. Think of Sies Marjam the second then as the show equivalent of the Godfather, Parts 1 and 2. For some reason the SS17 collection reminds me of those Yves Klein body paintings. It could be the colours, rich citrus hues and khakis, a single one per look, an exclamation point if you will, or the free flowing way the clothes hang off the body, suspended from simple straps, almost bin bag like in design, except that were you to cut a hole in a bin bag and simply fling it over your head, you wouldn’t even get close to this.
The higher the hair the closer to God, ergo the lower the hem the closer to hell – or something like that. Who cares anyway, it’s just filler copy detracting from the main point, the Rodarte show was inspired by beehives, the spirit of in fact. And the fear of. Beehive as in those things bees live in, not the hair. Though the higher the hair thing kind of works as bees can fly pretty higher, as does the closer to hell as Rodarte always like a floor skimming hem or five. There was a bit of a country and western sense to this though, in keeping with Dolly’s mantra. Ruffled lace tops with big puffy sleeves and frilly, wide v-necked decollatages worn with tiered skirts and a fringed sleeve on leather jackets for extra swish.
Think Lana Wachowski, the legendary director and star of Marc Jacobs’s last campaign trapped in a 90’s raver Matrix? And why the hell not? The candy coloured dreadlocks would certainly suggest so. As would the wet concrete flooring, techno soundtrack and cyberpunk meets 70’s punk clothing. A cornucopia of textures, colours, prints and jarring sensibilities, topped off with a sky high platform. Well, the higher the shoe the closer oblivion, or something like that. Would Matrix be the right way to describe this, or would a reverse back to the future make sense, you know future to the back?
Photographs by Jason Lloyd-Evans (from top) Hood by Air, Alexander Wang, Coach, Marc Jacobs…
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