Photos by Walter Grio. Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week Fall/Winter 2012 New York. Text by Anastasia Lambrou.
Think art studio-come-functional luxury with a neo 60’s architectural command. Let’s not ignore the brilliant beehive hair that drove this motif home. The theme was a lengthy silhouette emphasized with cropped jackets, pencil, as well as floor sweeping skirts, cinched at the waist with a skinny knotted belt or wide sash, sharp 60’s style cuts, tailored drainpipe cropped trousers, big hair, and ankle boots.
Prints were dark and suggestive of improvisation with brush-strokes, graphics, and collages, giving that sharp boxy 60’s construction an updated contemporary feel for day looks. There were rare bursts of color juxtaposed amongst graphics and even bold black and white stripes. She did include a few monochrome dresses in bright orange and others in shades of pink, while the general color palette was dark.
Outfits featured feather and fur accents, having the effect of softening the hard stiff fabrics and sharp construction of the garments. There were contrasting interjections of chiffon continuing from the three-quarter length cut of the jackets. Hair was styled with a soft and fluffy cotton candy tease and a solid black hair band, giving a feminine feel but defining it with that statement hair accessory. Ankle boots were the staple footwear choice throughout.
Coats were fashioned from swathes of textured fabric that emphasized the wrapped nature of their design. A shawl collar framed the decolletage graduating down to a defined waist before bursting outwards again, emphasizing the curves. A lenghtly silhouette was conveyed with form fitting pencil skirts that halted just below the knee, as well as those edgy drainpipe trousers exposing the ankle, a very elongating effect.
Jackets featured sharp and simple lines, cropped just below the bust and at the elbows, delivering that long slender form even more.
Those classic Herrera gowns glided over the runway in puffs of thick heavy fabric, featuring contrasting colors and graphics, some of which owing to British print designer Joe Duke, who incorporated a design for Hererra of her daughter’s face. This is a wearable collection influenced with a reinvented 60’s feel with firm fabrics conveying that strong stylish persona.
TRENDS
Headbands and big candy floss hair, mid-calf pencil skirts and dresses, drainpipe tailored trousers, cropped jackets, collage and graphic prints, waist defining knotted belts.
FAVORITES
Cropped jackets, floor sweeping skirts and gowns, graphic print and mid-calf dresses, knotted waist belts, big teased hair, and long leather gloves.
WHO
The executive style seeker. She wants a formal fusion of luxury and function.
WHERE
Work and play. The wearer wants an easy transition for social gatherings, mixing work and play is a part of her lifestyle. Gowns are perfect for her, they express her top-notch fashion sense without revealing too much.
