typeF Blogs

By Lisa Martinez

By Day 6 of New York Fashion Week, I had the finish line in my sightline. When you see SO MUCH fashion in so few days, it’s easy for it to all become jumbled. It’s almost as though I had blinked and the proverbial New York minute became magnified, exemplified, and nanofied, where all the isle of Manhattan was a fashion stage and I felt especially lucky to be in the audience this season!   

Rodarte
Film and music ingénues filled the Rodarte Spring 2012 Runway on Tuesday with Dakota Fanning, Elle Fanning, Taylor Swift, Saoirse Ronan, Rooney Mara, Solange Knowles, and Beyoncé Knowles on hand for the designers’ latest fantasy-meets-reality collection. Sartorial sisters Kate and Laura Mulleavy cited dual influences, the animated Disney classic Sleeping Beauty and Vincent Van Gogh, noting a correlation between the color stories of each. Backstage, Laura Mulleavy noted how, “He (Van Gogh) used yellow, a color that most people have an aversion to, but he made it feel so inviting…” With 35 new looks, the dreamscape palette of marigold, seafoam, lavender, pistachio, and night blue was the perfect backdrop for the collection’s star, sunflower, brushstroke, and blossom prints, which were abstracted, pixilated, and texturized for an enhanced dimensionality. The silhouette, particularly the shoulders and bodice had a somewhat 1940’s influences with a sprinkling of 80’s throughout, that was reminiscent of prom dresses. Layered looks remained strong, but were more structured, tailored, and architectural as demonstrated by a lovely wrinkled leather lambskin top and a painter’s smock top. Hemlines fluctuated from just below the knee to floor length with either asymmetrical trims or drop waists. The runway soundtrack featured Morrissey’s “Everyday is like Sunday” and Mazzy Star’s “Fade Into You.” During a season that tends to favor a more sun kissed, bronzed, natural face, the beauty direction here was a dark and moody emphasis on the eye. The sisters said they purposefully chose to do a heavier eye as a metaphor for finding something light and uplifting in darkness.   

Oscar de la Renta
Never one to fall victim to fickle trends, passing fancies, or ubiquitous trends – Oscar de la Renta has one presiding, overridingly consistent theme – to make a woman look her very best! He’s said that he doesn’t dictate trends, but instead that women dictate trends to him. Mr. de la Renta noted backstage that a woman’s power lies in her femininity and that is a tremendous asset. It is that blend of strength, grace, elegance, and empowerment upon which his sophisticated collection was built. There seemed to be something here for everyone amongst the 62 looks, spanning age groups, occasions, and silhouettes, whether billowy and dramatic like the opening looks -- embroidered bodices paired with voluminous and vivid taffeta gowns in shades of marigold, emerald and tomato red, respectively or more fitted looks like tweed skirt suits and signature sheaths for both day and evening. The highly saturated collection also featured daffodil, chartreuse, cobalt, and begonia.
Moving away from the tony Park Avenue church, where he has been showing for the past several seasons, to a new midtown showroom overlooking Bryant Park, the unfinished rough-hewn space provided the perfect clean slate of a backdrop to the masterfully tailored pieces. Justin Timberlake, Ashley Olsen, Nicki Manaj, Barbara Walters, and Valentino were all on the front row to enjoy the beautiful show. The Led Zeppelin runway soundtrack and wild, frizzy hair seemed to suggest a 70’s connotation, but once again the gentlemanly designer proved that his ensembles are classically timeless. The looks that prompted my strongest VISCERAL reaction were undoubtedly the floral appliqué and embroidered dresses and the pieces trimmed in an ostrich feather border. Insider gossip: I overheard an insider telling a guest that at lunch, only six hours earlier, Mr. de la Renta was concerned that he didn’t have enough straight dresses in the collection; naturally, he had his seamstresses prepare a few more options to keep the presentation balanced and one of those dresses was actually shown during Tuesday evening’s presentation, because when Oscar de la Renta speaks, we all wait with baited breath on the edge of our seats to hear what he has to say and to see what stunning creations he will unveil next…