PRADA: POWERFUL AND SOMBRE
SHORT REVIEW: Strict, powerful, beautiful. If this is austerity dressing I’ll take every piece.
LONG REVIEW:
Designer’s are grappling and aesthetic response to gloomy economic prospects. Many have decided that a version of covered up sensible chic is what’s needed. Hemlines have dropped and sex has fallen off the agenda. But if we are in for a period of austerity chic, then you can trust Miuccia Prada to turn the whole concept on its head. For autumn/winter 08 her silhouettes were long and lean and the key item was a fitted black lace shift. It was sometimes worn with a crisp blue man’s shirt underneath, or sometimes accessorised with strange modular pieces like with a clip-on nylon peplum or nude, bandage like neck cuff. The models looked as strict as Mrs Danvers with their hair pulled back from pale faces into leaser cut leather snoods.
There was nothing frivolous about the collection, which had an air of sombre grandeur – watching the models process, was as Marigay McKee, the flamboyant Harrods buyer said “like being at a mafia boss’s funeral in Sicily”. The only flare was in the winged shoes, which looked like they stepped straight out of a futurist manifesto. So Prada presented an austere restrained collection to suit the times, but here’s the twist. That lace is hand made in Switzerland and costs E 600 a metre, which makes Prada’s version of austerity chic a very expensive indeed. And all those sensual womanly shapes will serve to drive customers into the shops to buy, buy, buy. Who needs recession dressing when you have Prada? CLAUDIA CROFT
LONG REVIEW:
Designer’s are grappling and aesthetic response to gloomy economic prospects. Many have decided that a version of covered up sensible chic is what’s needed. Hemlines have dropped and sex has fallen off the agenda. But if we are in for a period of austerity chic, then you can trust Miuccia Prada to turn the whole concept on its head. For autumn/winter 08 her silhouettes were long and lean and the key item was a fitted black lace shift. It was sometimes worn with a crisp blue man’s shirt underneath, or sometimes accessorised with strange modular pieces like with a clip-on nylon peplum or nude, bandage like neck cuff. The models looked as strict as Mrs Danvers with their hair pulled back from pale faces into leaser cut leather snoods.
There was nothing frivolous about the collection, which had an air of sombre grandeur – watching the models process, was as Marigay McKee, the flamboyant Harrods buyer said “like being at a mafia boss’s funeral in Sicily”. The only flare was in the winged shoes, which looked like they stepped straight out of a futurist manifesto. So Prada presented an austere restrained collection to suit the times, but here’s the twist. That lace is hand made in Switzerland and costs E 600 a metre, which makes Prada’s version of austerity chic a very expensive indeed. And all those sensual womanly shapes will serve to drive customers into the shops to buy, buy, buy. Who needs recession dressing when you have Prada? CLAUDIA CROFT
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