1. Givenchy S/S 2014.
Dries Van Noten S/S 2014.
97 HarpersBAZAAR.com.au March 2014
JasonLloyd-Evans
-
The
bazaar
D
uring the noughties we gorged on fash-
ion.We maxed out our credit cards on It
bags and worshipped at the altar of Sex
and the City.Then, disaster: one Sunday
in September 2008 the US economy
went into meltdown. The Global Financial Crisis
rolled into town and riding in its wake was Phoebe
Philo of Céline offering us clean, simple, streamlined
clothes. Minimalism. Sure, it wasn’t fun, but it was
what we needed, coveted. It was something easy to
process (and easy to copy).In the meantime we curled
up on the couch and busied ourselves with this new-
fangled social media thingy. We became experts at
Twitter and Facebook, then Instagram, Pinterest,
Vine.We didn’t venture into as many stores.Eventually
we wanted to shop again, but online.
Now it’s 2014 and we’re exhausted, overstimu-
lated by the amount of time we spend on our
phones. Of course, no one’s laying down their
smartphones altogether — we’re loving this
e-commerce thing (we can buy anything,anywhere),
and besides, these new channels of communication
have taught us so much in six years. That all eyes are on
China.That Africa is on the rise as a luxury market, and
Middle Eastern countries such as Qatar are ones to
watch.We live in a globalised world and we’re grateful
for that. It’s just that we’d also like to get in touch with
our senses again. Use our hands. Smell, touch, feel.
Appreciate something unique. Feel empowered. Maybe
even have a bit of fun while we’re at it.
Enter the S/S 2014 season.
“I think we are ready for a move away from digitally
enhanced prints to something more handcrafted and folk-
inspired,”says trend forecasting companyWGSN’s head of
catwalks, Sue Evans.“To that end, new, innovative fabrics and tex-
tures are moving familiar silhouettes in a new direction.”The trend
forecaster cites painters Frida Kahlo and Georgia O’Keeffe as
women who encapsulate fashion’s new sensibility.“They lived their
From top:
Prada S/S 2014;
Bottega Veneta
S/S 2014; Céline
S/S 2014.
Valentino
S/S 2014.
Calvin Klein
Collection S/S 2014.
lives in the desert and created their own personal style draw-
ing on local crafts and traditions.” Also on her radar is the
upcoming exhibition Folk Couture:Fashion and Folk Art,at
the American Folk Art Museum in New York. “All these
things are about celebrating our culture and heritage — both
in danger of being lost as everything becomes digitalised.”
Thanks to our ever-increasing interconnectedness via tech-
nology, a new focus on local cultures has the potential to go
global,says Stylebop.com’s fashion director,LeilaYavari.“We’re
embracing another social, political, cultural worldview — one
of wanderlust and globalisation,” she says, citing Valentino
(which was inspired by traditional peasant needlework and
costumes from Rome’s Teatro dell’Opera) as a key collection,
and one to keep an eye out for when it lands in store.“Something
fringed fromValentino,like the cape,is definitely worth investing in.
It’s a statement piece that can easily be worked back with an LBD
or classic trousers,”she says.(Other brands that tapped into the trend
include DriesVan Noten, BottegaVeneta and Proenza Schouler.)
Swept up in all this,Evans says,is a new sense of female empow-
erment. “I saw lots of references to strong, independent women
who celebrate their personal style,” she says of the season.Among
those who championed this was Miuccia Prada, who commis-
sioned artists to paint 17 striking,unique murals of women for the
Prada show set that were featured on the clothes as well. SBS
network stylist Lesley Crawford says the
collection is one of the designer’s
strongest in several seasons. “Any piece
from it is worth investing in,” she says.
“It’s my favourite since the banana-and-
stripe S/S 2011 collection.”
Representations of female empower-
ment aside, Prada also touched on
something much more practical,though
no less appealing to women: flat shoes,
which featured heavily on the runway.
“The new trend towards masculine
footwear caught my eye because of its
strong feminist undercurrent,” explains
Yavari, who says a pair of Robert Clergerie sandals is on her
must-have list. Phoebe Philo helped cement the flats trend, send-
ing out her models at Céline in skater shoes with the words
“LOVE” and “LIFE” on the back. All the better to go with her
collection inspired by Brassaï’s graffiti photography, with more
than a whiff of ’80s club kid thrown in.Yes, she’s feeling fashion’s
new, expressive mood too, albeit from a more artistic perspective.
And that’s no surprise to Crawford.“Fashion is very cyclical,”
she says. “Pants are narrow then gradually become wider; skirt
hemlines go up, then come down. Designers need to surprise
and stimulate their audience.”
So if Philo is embracing bold, emotive prints (gasp!), are we
about to enter an equally forthright era of fashion?That’s down to
the bottom line, saysYavari.“There’s certainly hope for something
more lighthearted.A lot will be determined by how the consumer
responds to this new sense of airiness.”
Proenza
Schouler
S/S 2014
(and left).
MSGM S/S 2014.Céline S/S 2014.
craft
workPost-GFC minimalism
and amid the digitisastion
of, well, everything, fashion
delivers a season of folksy,
expressive fabulousness.
Clare Maclean feels the love
“We’re embracing
another social,
political, cultural
worldview — one
of wanderlust and
globalisation.”
– Leila Yavari