I just adore Richard Chai – Love and this season his look was screaming downtown -neo-grunge girl mixed with a casual sophistication “ To WWD ” said Chai, preshow. “This is the girl who rolls out of bed and throws on her boyfriend’s coat, but in a refined way.” And the coats were plenty, he wasn’t kidding. It was a major men’s wear statement with prettily tailored outerwear, cut generously and oversized. The strong boxy looks reminded me of the things I used to covet in the 80’s but done with more of an easy elegance. There were wrap coats over blazers; vests over double-breasted chesterfields and plenty of shoulders and flowing filmy silk dresses, slips and pleats, Of course there was the requisite Chai maxi length dress that we have come to love. It all felt modern, fresh and smouldering.
Luca Luca has gone through a little revamping as of late and the changes are paying off. This collection offered the same ladylike charms we have come to know from LL with a bit of glitz mixed in. Slim cut riding pants with fox jackets, eye catching wool jersey sheaths and pencil skirts all highlighting the body’s curves shown in bold color, prints and plenty of texture. A poplin capelet trench with leather pants and printed silk shirt caught the eye right off, as did sporty little pairings of jacquards, lamé and lace. The liberal mixing of prints and color made the basic white and black all that more alluring.
All day yesterday twitter was aflutter with bits about the body hugging pieces at Vena Cava. And after viewing the actual collection I get it. The story here was all about the 90’s, the dawning of the grunge age when Liz Tilberis transformed Harpers Bazaar and the likes of Donna Karan, and Giorgio Armani wanted to go grunge but still had to maintain a sense of red carpet allure… it harkened back to the days of Winona and Johnny when we thought that they were the perfect messy hair in the eyes couple. And the makeup a smokey smudgy mix of grays and silvery whites that only added to the devil may care feeling of the nineties girl.
And last but certainly not least Cristian Siriano sent out another collection to a packed house. It appears that the boy wonder is working at a dedicated pace to shake his reality show beginnings and prove that he has the chops to sustain collection after collection. For the season he hired stylist Danielle Nachmani who counts the Olsen girls as her clients to help pull back the usual grand glamour gestures that we have seen in collections past. And Siriano took a cue from last seasons spectacular Jil Sander show pairing muted tees with bold skirts. All in all the mood was a darker more serious girl this time and some of the expected ruffles and tuckings but I wonder how clients will respond to the new change in direction?
