COLLECTIONS

J.W ANDERSON – NEW GEN EXHIBITION – LONDON FASHION WEEK AW12 WOMENSWEAR/ 17.02.12

Mid-season collections are becoming more and more important for designers to make good financial use of the buying calendar. JW Anderson’s pre-fall offering consisted of characteristic bright, striped knits and gorgeous printed check separates. Mohair was a recurrent feature of many knitwear collections, continuing the late 70s punk-tinged mood that many designers became enamoured with this season.


Images by: Ieva Blaževičiūtė

Posted by: Amber Jane Butchart

SOPHIE THEALLET – NEW YORK FASHION WEEK AW12/ 15.02.12

A lot of carefully placed ribbons and silky fabric, as well as brightly coloured patterns dominated in Sophie Theallet‘s AW2012 Ready-to-wear collection in the New York Fashion week.The very first impression of the collection unfortunately was about the very strong eye make-up, which definitely made the models look very alien-like and emphasized on their facial features, yet was a bit distracting even given the strong colours that Sophie Theallet used.

 

The collection was opened with some brightly coloured dresses with old wallpaper-like patterns and continued with solid coloured, fluttering and almost see-through dresses, as well as very distinctive polo neck tops and blouses. Given that the whole collection was mostly about very feminine red, orange, black and magenta colours, as well as that the dominant pieces were both dresses and skirts, the collection still had a bit of an androgynous feeling to it. The model choice, the polo neck sweaters and the old-style patterns were reminiscent of  the legendary model Twiggy and the make-up made this image even stronger. The key element of this collection could be the use of the ribbons – tied around the neck, around the waist and both ways they showed that Sophie Theallet knows the ways how to make the old look completely new, sophisticated and fresh.

Image Source: Now Fashion

Posted by: Ieva Blaževičiūtė

NARCISO RODRIGUEZ – NEW YORK FASHION WEEK AW12 WOMENSWEAR/ 15.02.12

 

Image source: Style.com

Posted by: Ieva Blaževičiūtė

FASHION SHENZEN – LONDON FASHION WEEK SS12/ 19.09.11

Fashion Shenzen is an initiative to showcase the leading Chinese design and manufacturing talent as well as forging a link between students in the UK and China. Whilst they were established in 1988, SS12 serves as their third appearance showing at Vauxhall Fashion Scout and this season they brought two of the Shenzhen’s most noteworthy talents.

 

Making her London Fashion Week debut was designer Deng Hao who brought a refreshing palette of rich, earthy hues to contrast all the pastels, nudes and miscellaneous tones that have been saturating the runways this season.

With “regal Islamic mosques and traditional Chinese temples” as a starting point, Deng Hao’s collection worked to combine sparkling embroidery with delicate knitwear and long, flowing maxi dresses to elongate the female form to a beautifully sleek finish.

 

Designer Haiping Xie based his collection on Chinese tradition and created pieces using bright yellow – a historical signifier of royalty and used prints of the Chinese dragon on luxurious silk.

Tulle, tiered netting and ruffles added depth to predominantly blue pieces whilst modern, feminine shapes with bead detailing were juxtaposed by boyish bowl-cut hairpieces to provide an ambiguous edge to otherwise feminine designs.

 

As a testament to the talents of the two designers, a splattering of applause was intermingled with a sea of i-pads and cameras raised to capture the finale and commit them to history.

 

Images by: Ben Harrison

Posted by: Lauren Whitehead