Call it optimism or call it escapism, but
Spring 2010 is the season of the ruffled party dress: usually
short, often chiffon, and almost always nude (we refer to both the
color and the prevalence of sheer fabrics).
Marc Jacobs—who else?—kicked the trend into high gear with his
parade of ballet nymphs in
New York. The frill lasted all through
London,
Milan, and
Paris, taking in along the way
Christopher Kane,
Fendi, and Jacobs’ former protégé Peter Copping at
Nina Ricci. But toward the end of Paris, a counterinsurgency.
At
Celine, Phoebe Philo cleared the collective palate with a
collection that she herself described as “a kind of contemporary
minimalism.” Hannah MacGibbon was of a similar mind-set at Philo’s
former stomping ground
Chloé, and, thinking about it, the groundswell of “utility
chic” could be traced back via
Junya Watanabe’s pantsuits to
MaxMara’s back-to-what-we-do-best styles to…well, didn’t Marc
put those plain little raincoats over his ruffles? (And was it just
coincidence that the patron saint of contemporary minimalism, Jil
Sander, chose this moment to re-emerge with her +J line for
Uniqlo?) So, suddenly, two camps: one that flirts with
frivolousness but that also has the potential to create romance and
desire, the other practical but possibly in danger of coming across
as too plain. Check out the slideshow, then tell us, which side are
you on, and perhaps more pertinently, which approach will make you
open your wallet?
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