Designer Labels At New York Fashion Week, What’s On-Trend in SS12 And The HEM Index

Designer Labels Head to London fashion Week

No sooner are we reluctantly moving to our autumn wardrobes and recalling the designer labels we were wearing last winter, than we see London Fashion Week already upon us proclaiming the virtues of Spring/Summer 2012. This is a semi annual event where the worlds designer labels, famous and not so famous, congregate to showcase their collections for the season six months hence. The travelling circus of designers, buyers, journalists, bloggers, industry insiders and of course celebrities pitch their fashion big top for a week not only in London, but in the worlds other major fashion centres, namely; New York, Paris & Milan.

For those who covet the major designer labels and follow the shifting sands of style and changing trends, The fashion weeks represent an ideal opportunity to keep a close eye on what’s going to be hitting it big when you’re looking to next spring and summer for outfits. While a lot of the household designer labels choose to showcase their haute couture and conceptual designs, as these pieces are out of reach to many of us mere mortals, our objective therefore is to see the trends emerge as themes as a clue as to what the designer labels have in store for us come next spring when the ready to wear collections are launched for general sale.

New York Is Best To For Mainstream Designer Labels

The best barometer of this is New York fashion week where they tend to showcase collections which cater to the home market, for Americans on the whole are a little more conservative in their fashion tastes. New York has a tendency to show a more traditional clean lines type of style, with “less directional” and more “ready to wear” collections (read “commercial fashion”) mainstream designer labels who have a runway during this week typically include Ralph Lauren, Calvin Klein and Marc Jacob. Where as the shows in London, Paris or Milan weeks tend to push the envelope a little more. Some purists may suggest its “safe fashion”, but I argue for the punter who spends their “hard earned” on designer dresses every now and again, its the clearest way for many to make an informed decision about the investments they will make on designer labels next season.

Jason Wu SS12	Philip Lim SS12

Having observed over the past week New York’s output, there seems to be little invention and no major departure from what has gone before, but that’s not such bad news, as in the main, what you’ve been wearing during the past summer is most likely still going to be relevant next year too, and so having to match up old and new pieces in SS12 wardrobe will be the ideal basis of a great, and ever evolving capsule wardrobe.

What Trends To Look For in SS11

What seems to be the big trend this time round is a move towards a more casual, lifestyle look which has been dubbed “Urban Sport” as the name suggests its full of soft tailoring, and strikes an easy balance between both street and office wear. Nowhere was this better illustrated than with Philp Lim and his Kite inspired runway show showing cocktails and shift dress made of flowing parachute silk, the ideal canvas on which to work, the airy loose style was the perfect interpretation of his signature soft tailoring.
Jason Wu, Michelle Obama’s designer label of choice also followed the theme of soft tailoring with a mix of urban sport influences and smart casual clothing as did Marc Jacob, Alexander Wang and Preen.

Preen Block colours, powder shades	Michael Kors SS12 -Afri-luxe

Another big trend is colour…bright bold colours, citrus brights, neon, these were used in block colours, which is a trend that will continue into next season, and the tribal look which will dominate next summer, though yellow seemed to pop up more frequently than any other colour.

As mentioned above, the tribal look is making a reappearance, an alternative label coined by Michael Kor is “Afri-Luxe”, we might refer to it as tribal/safari, but it was a strong showing in his runway show. The Kor designer Label which has been built upon the his home grown market of the U.S. and taken the all American casual sportswear and added luxury and embellishments. Kor has applied acres of Zebra, Python and Leopard skin prints to his swimwear, romper suits, shift and cocktail dresses to create “Serengeti style” (that’s my own label I’ve given the look). Proenza Schouler followed suit with the safari/tribal trend featuring conceptualised giraffe and tiger prints across the collection too, so is a sure fire contender to be hot in 2012.

And So To The HEM index, And What The Hell Is It?

We couldn’t leave a fashion trend review without mentioning the “Hem Index”, for you who don’t know its a theory put forward by economist George Taylor’s back in the 1920′s, when he referred to hemlines lengths changing in line with the economy, as the economy gets weaker, hemline get longer and vice versa. In the midst of what seems like harder economic times and austerity, in the case of New York fashion week and the designer labels who had runways, the results were inconclusive as there was a bevy of asymmetrical and handkerchief hems which will leave economists to draw mixed concisions, though as ever austerity and high end designer labels are uncomfortable bed fellows.

Image Credits – Metro

filed under – designer labels