Finesse. Danielle Frankel AW25

April 14, 2025 | Design & Culture by Ed

I said it once, I will say again: Danielle Frankel is the contemporary maestra of bridalwear. Her designs are so exquisitely crafted and majestic in execution that you will inevitably desire to wear one of her dresses not only on that most special day, but on many other occasions. Dominated by bold, architectural, Art Deco shapes and Erté-inspired forms, the latest collection stuns with incredible construction and finesse.

Take the micro-pleated dress that swishes and swirls around the body, like flowing water. Except this isn’t a styling trick; the micro-pleats in the dress are actually hundreds of micro-bones holding the shape. Then, there’s the hand-painted silk chiffon made in collaboration with a French artist who moved in to Frankel’s New York atelier for a few weeks and created a breath-taking, impressionistic floral gown in dark green as well as the hand-painted organza cocoon worn by Kristen McMenamy in the lookbook.

Frankel makes all of her dresses in Manhattan’s Garment District, and she has a talented group of designers in her atelier that can rival any haute couture house. The finale gown, also modeled by McMenamy, is made of 100,000 petals which took the atelier four months to sew by hand. Somehow, it looks effortless – just like any truly great couture garment.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Marmo. Pucci SS25

April 5, 2025 | Design & Culture by Ed

Camille Miceli‘s latest Pucci collection was refreshing: not only because of its restrained color palette consisting of only black, white and shoft-shell pink, but because it felt essential (and at the same time exuberant – not an easy pairing to achieve). Presented at La Cervara, a medieval hilltop abbey with hidden cloisters just around Portofino, the spring-summer 2025 outing was dedicated to the Marmo motif, “the first print that seduced me,” the designer mused. Originally conceived by Emilio Pucci when he found himself mesmerized by the sunlit ripples inside Capri’s Grotta Azzurra, the swirling pattern carries a hypnotic, groovy rhythm. Miceli sublimated and revamped it, weaving it through the collection not only through kaleidoscopic prints, but metallic studs on palazzo pants and black-and-white beads on finale eveningwear, mini and maxi, that had a vintage flair, but in the end looked rather contemporary. The designer also excels when she blends Pucci’s very-Italian glamour with more rough, utilitarian touches. I loved how she combined a high-neck windcheater with an ankle-length skirt, completing the look with layers of silver jewels.

ED’s SELECTION:

PUCCI Printed Silk-twill Scarf

PUCCI Fringed Raffia And Organza Jacket

PUCCI Embellished Embroidered Leather Wedge Sandals

PUCCI Big Marmo Printed Silk-twill Kaftan

PUCCI Printed Silk-twill Scarf

PUCCI Leather-trimmed Knotted Printed Silk-twill Shoulder Bag

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Wild Things. Andreas Kronthaler Vivienne Westwood AW24

March 4, 2024 | Design & Culture by Ed

Wild things were going on at the Andreas Kronthaler for Vivienne Westwood runway this season. The autumn-winter 2024 show’s bizarrely eclectic adventures in time travel unfolded around some highly entertaining performance art by Sons of Sissy, a trio of dancers and musicians who blended pagan ritual with high camp and impressions of birdsong and weather events – the bum drumming was a particular highlight. With Sam Smith, Lila Moss and Amelia Hamlin on the catwalk, Andreas Kronthaler presented a collection that was inspired by a Giovanni Battista Moroni exhibition in Milan, and also by protective sportswear (jockstraps were seen all over the line-up). Signature corseted gowns with exaggerated frills and ruffles were juxtaposed with super revealing menswear and jersey materials. Grotesque can be fun and intriguing, but sometimes it might get out of hands.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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The Raven. Thom Browne AW24

February 16, 2024 | Design & Culture by Ed

Thom Browne‘s autum-winter 2024 show was a compelling and theatrical NYFW send off. An ominous broken window in the centre of the runway coupled with barren trees, including a towering nine metre one swaddled in a puffer coat, set an eerie tone. As Anna Cleveland entered, clad in a tweed and a black headpiece, to the crowd’s surprise the largest tree began to move – it was a model on stilts. Suddenly, at the hem, children began to pop out, four in total. The soundtrack playing while this was all happening? Naturally Edgar Allen Poe’s The Raven, as narrated by Carrie Coon. The magnificent Kristen McMenamy was next to hit the runway, clad in a coat covered in ravens and gravity-defying braids. Twisted and dark, the subsequent parade of looks highlight what Browne does best, take preppy, classic standards like tweeds and tailoring and transform them into works of art with a perverse, sinister allure. A trenchcoat gets the bondage treatment, courtesy of rows of straps that line the back while a resin dipped jacket resembles a black ooze infecting a rainbow-hued world. Waists were cinched and blazers were exaggerated, creating both slim and bulbous silhouettes in equal fashion. Alex Consani’s finale as the mantis meant gold gilded braids turned into antennae as well as a face full of foil, complete with matching lashes. At its heart The Raven is a tale of distraught love and the madness that entails from it. Browne managed to convey all these feeling in this stunning fashion-show-slash-performance.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Clubbing. Valentino SS23 Couture

January 27, 2023 | Design & Culture by Ed

This season, Pierpaolo Piccioli took Valentino haute couture to the club, leaving behind the highly elevated feeling he so succesfully conveyed in the last couple or years. His venue, at night, was a famous Paris joint under the Pont Alexandre. His point about standing for inclusivity is definitely intended to be heard by the wider world of young people. “Of course, I love it that haute couture is about the magic of impossible challenges,” he began. “Of course it’s about craft, and we talk about that all the time, but I also love it when couture feels effortless. It’s all about the feeling of having something for yourself. It’s kind of democratic in a way, in the idea of showing this freedom of being whoever you want to be.” On his inspiration board were photos of clubs in the 1980s, ranging from Studio 54 to London’s New Romantic Blitz Club, the Club For Heroes one-nighter and the Taboo, hosted by the outrageous performance artist Leigh Bowery. What all these scenes, underground or jet-set, had in common was that they were hotbeds for generating fashion and havens for what used to be called ‘gender-bending.’ “The difference was that then, it was behind closed doors. Now it’s something we have for life. It’s today’s way of freedom,” he argued. “So I love the idea of a club, but it’s a club for today. Thinking of inclusivity as welcoming people for who they are, and who they want to be. So it’s invitation to be free to be what you want ro be, mixed with the codes of Mr. Valentino in the ’80s.” Still, haute couture formalities were observed in a way – Valentino’s creatures of the night weren’t presented as a wild crowd of dancers, but as models walking on a runway, haute couture standards of solemnity preserved. What emerged from the darkness were pops of color, dark Parisian sexy black transparent lingerie dresses, and many varieties of strategic body-exposure. In 89 looks, Piccioli put forward individualism in tiny pelmet skirts or cutaway bodysuits implanted with giant bows worn with floor-trailing capes, a dress with cutout polkadot portholes, and white shirts and ties styled with micro-minis (one with a dramatic red sequin trench). In overall this wasn’t my favorite Valentino couture moment, but Piccioli definitely had some working on it.