London Fashion Week [S/S ’13] – The Roundup

Paris Fashion Week is on as we speak, the final week of fashion month, featuring the crème de la crème of the global fashion industry. Watch this space for my favourite of the shows.

In the meantime, I’ve put together my round up of London Fashion Week. Overall, the shows didn’t get rave reviews but you know there will always be beautiful fashion in there somewhere. Roksanda Illincic stood out, it was an explosion of colour combinations and fabric combinations, and there were the designers from the Fashion Fringe competition. Dig in…

Roksanda Illincic

The collection combined so many stare worthy elements. The foundation was ultra feminine cuts and shapes, build on top of that unusual yet stunning color combos and gorgeous fabrics like silk and tweed and you have a delicious confection.

 

Temperly London

The fifties silhouette will have my heart any day and I got a pleasant surprise from Temperly London. Perhaps we could have a micro trend for the season. The silk wide leg pants and sequin blouse look was absolutely stunning, I dream of myself in outfits like that.

 

 

Fashion Fringe Designers – Haizhen Wang & Teija Eilola

The most unexpected place where I got my ultimate fashion high was at the ‘design feet’ of brand new freshers. Two of the three finalists of the Fashion Fringe competition (think London version of Project Runway) absolutely took my breath away.

Haizhen Wang

My first thought on seeing the pieces in this collection was Haider Ackermann! The deconstruction, generous layering/draping, rock solid structure and combination of contrasting fabrics (think leather and silk) was reminiscent of Ackermann. The designer, Haizhen Wang is an alum of Central St Martins and worked at MaxMara, Boudicca, and AllSaints; I definitely see AllSaints in there. He made an excellent showing of himself and I found he won the competition, too well deserved.

 

 

 

 

 

 

Teija Eilola

Teija’s collection got me in the very detailed yet simple and fresh feel. I loved the balloon sleeves on the striped dress and crisp white blouse. All very wearable with a lot of interest.

 

 

 

 

 

 

 

Photo credit: styledotcom

The stunner Burberry Prorsum delivered…LFW S/S 12

My Spring 2012 fashion week retrospective continues…

I have to say i’m pleasantly stunned and so inspired by what Burberry put on display in London. A fresh, eclectic departure from the norm. If you were expecting to see trench coats and the signature checks, plaids and neutral hues, well think again.

This collection was packed full of bold tribal print, crochet designs, wood and bead detailing, the accessories – bags, shoes, hats – were intricately designed and so so bright and beautiful.

I’ve put together a collage of my best picks from the  beautiful collection. This is arguably my best of the Spring 2012 collections, it’s a call to break out and do something different. Christopher Bailey described the collection as ‘Joyous, upbeat, nostalgic.’ With this collection, he wanted to celebrate things that take time to do instead of delivering the status quo. Great results coming out of that thinking, it’s spectacular and beautiful.

And of course, the outer wear wasn’t completely excluded, that’s the Burberry classic, the style, cut and design was just updated. In an eclectic way.

 

Photo credits: Styledotcom, Elle.com

Paris Fashion Week: my love-hate relationship with Vivienne Westwood

I’ve had a longstanding love-hate relationship with Vivienne Westwood. No hard feelings for this legendary fashion icon, i mean, she’s been making fashion long before i could say ‘skirt.’ Thing is, i find her on the far edge of quirky, very close to extreme eccentricity (duh?!). But i absolutely love Anglomania, her diffusion line; beautiful pieces, quirky silhouettes but just the right amount of quirky. I have a polyvore set for the A/W 10 collection. The red label is great as well, lovely collection at London fashion week.

But you see, it’s this showing at PFW that makes me wonder what’s up? I’m an advocate of wearable fashion but you’d find me rooting for fashion-as-art just as passionately. The issue i have here is where to place Dame Westwood’s collection? Well, maybe some kind of eccentric art a la Damien Hirst? Hmmm….

She did have a beautiful ball gown to close the show though. That, i like.

Pictures via style.com

LFW: Colour Cocktail at Issa

It was an elegant colour fest at Issa and i looooooved it! The collection was inspired by designer Daniella Issa Helayel’s visit to India and her fascination with the bright colourful saris won by Indian women.

I love the jewel tones, crispy whites, pretty pinks and all the colour clashing. The generous draping, figure skimming styles looked absolutely elegant on the models. A very chic way to rock vibrant colours. Really really fun, a feast for the girly at heart. Here are my favs from the collection

Pics courtesy style.com

LFW: We love Erdem

Erdem is a designer after my heart because he represents all things girly. Florals, lace, cutesy dresses, Muah! Love you Erdem! Here are my favs from SS 2011

Pics courtesy style.com

Prints to a whole ‘nother level by Mary Katrantzou

Uber cutting edge, super elegant use of prints that come across as oriental meets digital.

Pics courtesy style.com

London Fashion Week…hmmm…

Been looking at the LFW collections…hmmm. Clearly completely different from the collections and trends from NYFW. For me, it’s been either of two extremes, quirky bordering on weirdly unwearable or simple bordering on boring.

So, after trawling through the collections so far, the sunshine came out. Presenting Osman Yousefzada…

Love the structure, love the fit, most especially love the way he gives a fresh edge to the basic classic cuts. Really refreshing.

Looking forward to some more great fashion as the week rolls by.

Pics courtesy style.com