London Fashion Week tailors to Barbie fans and Nineties cool girls on day four

DGetting your collection on the last royal day Mourning It’s a tough gig. In this instance, reading the room means guessing the fashion pack and the mood of some 68 million Britons. Fortunately, the fourth day London Fashion Week Hit the right note.

Rising star Nancy Dujaka takes on the challenge of her label’s characteristically sensitive USP with tact and integrity, while Rizzee King David Koma delivers his tribute with the quietest you can imagine. is better. His majesty was always partial to a touch, and would hardly have discouraged an institution which he so earnestly supported.

In fact, Halpern plays up the power of hope in light of so many losses in pallet gowns and ruching. Sure, this Monday’s looks would make for dubious mourning attire, but they are, nonetheless, testament to the defiant spirit that has guided Queen Elizabeth through adversity and, more broadly, the admiration of her great British public. Who was

While collections prior to Day 4 were marked by their stark variety – from a quiet farewell at Daniel W. Fletcher to a flurry of excitement at Molly Goddard – this Sunday was unanimously positive. Felt emotional.

Ending with the city’s beloved designer Christopher Kane, it was a mixed bag that both celebrated London’s creative influence and kept the context well in mind. Striking this balance through empowerment, glamor and sophistication, the collections put women in womenswear in an unmistakably feminine offering that echoed the Saturday collections of SS Daley, Eudon Choi and JW Anderson. Androgyny and co-ed casting juxtaposed.

Kicking off the proceedings, Albanian-born Nancy Dujaka delivered a stunning ode to the female body, making every editor and influencer worthy of their Tik Tok or Instagram strip lights in a north London photography studio. Followed the pews. Here, each guest was greeted with white confetti and hydrangeas, a pure detail that brought home the significance of the day.

“The flower was quite literal,” he explained backstage. “But it was also in the veil.” Indeed, the floral motif was realized in elaborate trains and brooches that anchored criss-cross spaghetti straps. Fluttering pants that softened into a sheath, shaped bodysuits with o-ring hardware and Lorex garters cut with angular relief, all spoke to a woman of the house in her body.

These were clothes for posing in La Grace Jones. Unsurprisingly, then, he was an early reference to photographer Jean-Paul Goode Dujaca. Rest assured, it seems the Dujaka girl is happy to flash the skin but only on her own terms. Erogenous zones, these are not.

Rather, this Dujaka was proving that what you don’t show counts as much as what you do. Appearing on the official Fashion Week schedule for the third time, the explosion of footwear, the deployment of now signature lingerie designs, and the introduction of denim and footwear, has officially cemented its status as a London fixture. . Dujaka has found his feet. Her go-to shoes? Crystal-embellished kitten heels are guaranteed to slay.

Afterwards, the fashion pack crashed into the white brick walls of Yeomanry House in central London for 16Arlington. Clearly, the fatigue of the weekend was starting to set in, with guests clutching their takeaway coffees on the FROW, and their sunglasses firmly on.

This is the brand’s second show following the devastatingly sudden loss of Federica “Kika” Cavinati, who co-founded the brand with partner Marco Capaldo in 2017. Titled “Forget Me Not”, the collection was inspired by wild flowers. Represents eternal love, devotion and remembrance. It was a joyous celebration, though, featuring many of 16 Arlington’s signature tropes: glitter, sequins, faux fur.

The brand is known for going all out with its elegance – and the Spring/Summer 2023 collection is a fitting partnership that will make plenty of headlines on London’s dimly lit streets next year. Hemlines were micro as always. Crystal studs adorn strapless dresses, mini skirts and tailored overcoats. The leathers were tighter, the satins shinier than ever. Elegant Maribo coats come in full length with power shoulders.

Python prints were also plentiful with thigh-high slits, along with white and gray variations on suits and maxi skirts. There was something satisfyingly Nineties about low-rise silk skirts styled with sleeveless tank tops – perhaps a party look for the nostalgic cool girl.

Overall, the collection was a sensational tribute to party women everywhere. It was, as the show notes put it, “unforgettable womenswear”. But one woman in particular, of course, was uppermost in everyone’s mind.

Then it was on to Rejina Pyo. With floor-to-ceiling windows on the 28th floor of an office building behind Bloomsbury, the collection was surrounded by the London skyline. An appropriate choice, as it happens, given that the collection was a celebration of women “and what it means to love and work with it,” the show’s notes said.

And there were many women who sat in the front row doing just that, including Sharon Horgan, Imogen Potts, and Jessie Ware. They were all dressed in Pyo’s delicious designs, with Horgan wearing a particularly stunning blue trouser suit as she serenaded herself with the show’s notes – those windows made the venue look a bit like a greenhouse. felt

The business theme can be felt throughout the collection, which has quite large sizes. A working girlstyle tailoring, and a largely corporate palette that includes beige, dark grey, sage green, lemon, taupe and cream. Pops of color came via a cobalt blue wide-leg suit and a backless fuchsia slip dress – a day-to-night option, perhaps.

Button-up tops were reinvented in sheer fabrics, while delicate crocheted bras were draped over plain T-shirts. Pencil skirts were modernized with strategic styling: worn over a strappy bodysuit and accessorized with yellow sunglasses. While mesh yellow and green bodycon dresses were sexed up with circular cutouts all over the body. There was also lace: buttercup yellow on the lingerie skirt and elsewhere on the white and floral bodysuit.

The show notes summed up the collection with a quote from Tolstoy: “If one knows how to work and love, one can live brilliantly in this world.” They sure can – especially if they’re wearing Rejina Pyo.

At David Coma, we were treated to the outdoor theater Courtyard Gallery, which according to the designer has hosted early Shakespeare shows. Perhaps it was fitting, then, that once the minute’s silence for Maharaj was over, Koma’s show began the drama.

“To be honest with you, it all started with a gasoline stain on the floor,” Koma said backstage. And so, we saw flamboyance in buckets, splashing like an oil spill on biker jackets, knee-high boots and costume jewelry that wrapped bodies like glistening muscles from the sea.

Coma said, “I’m inspired by incredible women in a mostly male-dominated field. This time, it was marine biologist Sylvia Earle, whose poetic descriptions of the world below sparked a frenzy in Coma. Our Despite the fact, sitting out amid global mourning, Koma takes us deep, recreating her vision of Atlantis with pearl pendants, starfish buckles and mirrored barnacle dresses.

Throughout, chainmail was present, perhaps a nod to the spectacle, but so was Mugler’s house, which lost its personality that year as well. With bejeweled blade inserts and whimsical slip-on shoes, her traditional tropes – the marabou, puff ball and ball gown – embrace a theatrical style rooted in fantasy. There’s an upside: For all the accusations of frivolous fashion faces, clothes like these are a welcome refuge in turbulent times.

The same could be said of Halpern’s collection, although, despite the glitz, there was something genuinely at play. Kicking off the show with no music, a tanned model swayed the crowd single-handedly as she shuffled her heels across the marble floor.

The noise from the Royal Exchange Bank, where the show took place, made this tribute to the late Queen all the more disturbing. Then, the show went as planned. “It’s the only way I know how to do things, through clothes,” Michael Halpern told us after the show. It was his way of saying thank you and sorry.

“To me, the most respectful thing you can do is to keep creating,” Halpern said. And boy, did he. Glorious velvet blazers sparkled so brightly that actual rainbows scattered across the floor before the models. Meanwhile, the unprecedented amount of sequins dazzled the audience. Verbatim!

At points, you could actually smell the lubricated latex of the baby punk evening gloves as they made their way through the crowd. Meanwhile, the tulle top jumpsuit took a Bowie-inspired edge to the designer’s disco designs. Inappropriate? not at all. impressive? Absolutely. Again, despite the fantastical elements at play, it came from an honest love of dress-up.

Michael, who grew up in New York with a mother who raised him as her own, loved Barbie as a child, and so, the pink wig, playdough palette and strappy heels all felt honest. The icing on this exciting, infinitely ruched cake? Barbie handbag with fuchsia typeface, designed as part of an exclusive collaboration. If you’re looking for a new IT bag, consider this one.