Carly Mark

It’s great to see some of the most exciting New York-based labels gradually returning with their new collections. How about some lockdown-era avant-garde? There was a time not so long ago when Carly Mark’s Puppets & Puppets might have seemed more like an art project than a fashion brand. Mark is, after all, one of New York’s most well-known mixed-media artists. But over the course of this pandemic year, she has recalibrated her fashion work, turning it into a true business ( new production manager was brought on and factories in Italy were contracted, as were knitting artisans in Bolivia and Peru). Mark is charting a course in which Puppets & Puppets is just as much a clothing company as a creative expression. Her historically minded bustles, panniers, and corsetry remain as the label’s signature, only now there is boning interfaced into the garments to make them easier to put on and wear. Denim in a medium wash straight-leg style is new, and there is an expansive knitwear program that brings together artists in New York and South America over pomegranate sweaters, logo intarsias, and azure maxi-dresses. In the brand’s look book, cast by Anita Bitton, there’s Jane Moseley posing in a crinoline skirt made of sunny florals, and the stylist Patti Wilson, a longtime supporter of the label, taking a turn in card-print suiting and a patchwork dress. That’s the ultimate goal of Mark’s expansion project: to ensure that her community and collaborators can continue to be a part of her world.

“Live” collage by Edward Kanarecki.

Small and independent brands in New York are unconventional, eclectic and intriguingly chaotic. And they catch your attention right away. Meet Puppets and Puppets, an indie label launched earlier this year by contemporary artist Carly Mark and garment construction student, Ayla Argentina. Their spring-summer 2020 collection is, as the designers sum up, an intersection point of tsar’s vestments and archetypal American capitalist uniform, a place where fantasy still exists. Basically speaking, the collection is a surprising remix of inspirations like Fabergé eggs, the Grand Duchess Anastasia of Russia and… American Psycho. There were some cheeky intepretations of the imperial egg – shoes fashioned from egg cartons and little bralette nipple coverings made to look like fried eggs (very Sarah Lucas) – but there were also some very literal nods, like the garments constructed with bulbous, protruding crinolines at the hips. Meanwhile the hand-knitted floral tunic-dress or the green velvet top styled with a red, full-skirt embroidered with forest animals motifs sparked affiliations of tsarist opulence and love for intricate craftsmanship (my first throught once seeing those looks: Ulyana Sergeenko’s brand, but not this strictly elegant and done in a funky, New York way). Speaking of American Psycho, this part felt a bit forced and unneeded, but somehow worked with the rest of the collection. White shirts with red ties and Wall Street tailoring were here, but went through complete exaggeration of volumes and lenghts. Puppets and Puppets spring-summer 2020 is fun and theatrical, but when you put the clothes apart, they seem to be approachable and wearable. I wonder what direction the brand takes next.