This season, I've clocked up over 170 shows and presentations during fashion month which isn't actually a lot compared to the actual number of shows/presentations that are on/off schedule. But it's a personal best for me. It suddenly triggered this season that 'stories' or 'strands' (or more commonly known as 'trends' but I'm going with other words...) were forming in my head with Paris making certain things concrete. Then once I start farming through my deluge of emails that I've missed out on over the past few weeks, I discover other collections that actually work within my 'stories/strands'. There's a mind map of storyboarded fashion brewing inside my brain and it's pretty murky/scary at the moment given that S/S 10 is far, far away but still, the strands insist on spinning...
One of these strands is a fine one that probably exists in my head only but it's this emphasis on raw materials, on rustic crafts. It's not that kind of 'boho' brand of rustic where things are overly thought-out and overwrought. There's something a bit naive and childish about everything... Hamburg-based designer Marie Louise Vogt's latest collection fell into my inbox and said strand was born. That said, Vogt has always worked with unconventional materials, concentrating on singular pieces which results in patchworked, hand-made pieces that come from initial experimentation. So her past collections have always included some element of knitting or crocheting that are craft - as opposed to fashion - centric. Her S/S 10 collection seems to be a play on flower power, or on the cliches associated with flower children. And so you get a series of pieces that I'd wear with not much else and a blossoming flower painted on my face...
