In between the hiatuses, the rare time a new post surfaces on this blog. Inevitably, one of those posts usually focuses on the New York based designer, Thom Browne. Those who know well of this blog will understand a great love I have for this designer and his brand. It comes from that drama that is embedded deep in the seams of the clothes. His humour, sense of wit and light-hearted approach to each collection; not to be confused with the twistedness and obscurity involved in his presentations (see Spring/Summer 2014). Just that ‘I don’t give a **** what you think’ attitude, ‘this is what I want to do, like it or not’. And this blogger is for one to love it. As mentioned previously: resort, cruise, pre-spring, pre-collection, whatever, acts as the time to experiment a little bit more and delve into those new ideas. To test the waters before hitting it big. Which usually involves some sort of incline to where the new ready-to-wear season will take us; what are we looking at in a bigger scale? For Browne, this isn’t the case. Browne’s last two seasons of resort and pre-fall are very much far apart from the mainline collections. Of course, they were some slight paired down ideas hidden in the pre collections yet the mainline shows demonstrated a very much different direction. Not that I am complaining; who wants to see regurgitated ideas anyway? This idea usually applies to the breed of commercial high end designers who shows no real difference between the pre and ready-to-wear collections who’d rather do pretty but uninspiring. Last week I read a Suzy Menkes article regarding the recent Resort 2015 season. Menkes brought to attention of how the pre collection are in store for a longer period of time than the mainline collection, more importantly, they sell at full price far longer where mainline lives a short lived life before found in a sample bin. So there’s money to be made in the pre collections of fashion (especially for the likes of Thom Browne) so it makes sense to release a less drama filled collection of accessible commercial items that fall into the dreaded category of “wearable” for the modern woman. Leaving the mainline to take the full credit of something more inspiring and ground breaking. Which is rare to see now in the fashion world. Brown’s R-T-W collection always fuse the ideas of couture and ready to wear together, an aspect that McQueen was fond of and still is present in Sarah Burton’s collection. There was a time in fashion where the R-T-W mainline collections consisted of a short presentation or catwalk event featuring the latest fashion for each season that are now regarded as couture. When fashion houses first set up such of the likes of Christian Dior and Balenciaga, they were regarded as the Couture Houses. Yet we often see recycled ideas and non-challenging ideas present against the resort and mainline collections. In a fast moving industry, we turn over season after season; not giving you the chance to even wear the last season of the last unmemorable collections. This is the downfall; we have moved forward, past the idea of couture as it is no longer widely accessible to the public and can be more expensive than its own good. Yet at the current time we sit in the fashion world, how much longer can these four collections and diffusion lines all last?
Nonetheless, Thom Browne’s Resort 2015 proved to be another great season for the designer. Signature pieces resurfaced to the collection with Browne’s fond of the naval schoolboy pin stripe with tweed suits. Yet a Peter Pan collar on red coat dress and black overcoat covered in three-dimensional flowers stood out to be the winners of this collection. There was cut-aways in overcoats creating a new look to a tuxedo which followed through to long slits in hems of dresses and skirts; giving a sense of drama to twirl around in. This idea was presented in great wild coloured floral print flared dress; prefect for twirling and feeling ultra-feminine in. No woman would be able to resist. There was a slight Prada-esque feel to the collection with pale blue dresses with white binded edges that felt origami like in the way the fabric had been manipulated to fold round as layers with the addition of the three petal flowers sewn onto the garments. Yet Browne presented this idea in his own right. Browne demonstrated that this wasn’t just another resort collection and was indeed far more. A collection that would be memorable and overall another great season for Browne. See the rest of looks here.
