Printed, sewn on or attached: flowers play a major role in the current summer collections. No wonder in dark times!
For her: Bring on the style blossoms!
Flowers never disappear from women’s fashion, only in the modern streetscape they have disappeared a bit in recent years, apart from the obligatory summer rags. Out of sheer fear of attracting attention, no one dares anything lavish anymore, and besides, good floral prints are expensive. It’s a good thing that flowers no longer only play a major role as fabric prints, but also as fabric sculptures. Yes, everything has been there before, but that’s no reason not to take part. With Roksanda, for example, a rosette on the dress has turned out to be so elephant-like that you can no longer see the skirt at all. But we don’t want to overwhelm the modern woman, who has dressed in minimalist coffee shop colors for safety reasons for the last few years. The first step for adding a little more wit and drama would be small fabric rosettes on the white cotton lapels, just like Prada’s this summer. But our favorite is this abstract, pleated blossom on the shirt by flower god Dries Van Noten, or as fans say: the thinking woman’s favorite designer. If only she didn’t think so much, the thinking woman, one would like to exclaim, especially when it comes to fashion. Then she could calmly fulfill her greatest wish, which is to put a funny parrot on her shoulder and talk to it. But because there are red lines when it comes to attracting attention, the Dries flower, which comes pretty close to the fluffy plumage feeling, has to do it first. Too bad she doesn’t answer.
For him: The new anti-sadness
Whether in the Munich Kunsthalle or in the current collections of the big fashion labels: flower power is the alternative energy source of the moment, and this year, for once, it doesn’t just seem to have something to do with the approaching spring. Rather, it seems as if the collective viewing of flowers is therapy against the general gray of the world and winter and, to a certain extent, also an ultima ratio: even if nothing really helps in view of all the bomb and earthquake debris, remembering the cornflower might still help will eventually make its way through misery. Seen from such a therapeutic point of view, this ensemble by Louis Vuitton is a fairly high-dose preparation. Anyone who arrives as a running meadow of poppies with a matching cap definitely has a peaceful aura on the order of Gandhi and is only remotely reminiscent of advertising for light margarine. Of course, civilian wildflowers on clothing are also the opposite of military camouflage. However, such expressive looks have one fundamental disadvantage, regardless of whether they show flowers, birds of paradise or other exalted patterns: They are actually worn out after a big evening. Women know the problem with special clothes – benevolence and the wow effect are easy to collect on the first appearance, but only once. If you come back to the vernissage with a floral front two weeks later, the look has already lost a lot of its radiance. It’s just like that: poppies fade quickly, even if they come from Paris.