Mary Katrantzou

Spring 2012

Spring, 2012


Spring 2012 (All photos above credited to Style.com)


Rodarte uses the digital projection technique--Fall 2011 source: Vogue


Anna Dello Russo in Mary Katrantzou, source: FAJO magazine

Dear Charlotte,

I am aware that you aren’t a big floral fan. This is a fact that I have always accepted due to the froufrou 80’s prom dress that pops into my head upon the mention of floral attire. However, somehow Mary Katrantzou has changed my mind.

Katrantzou has a knack for prints. That’s actually quite an understatement, seeing as she’s at the forefront of a new era in fashion, in which digitalized images can be incorporated into clothes. Both Rodarte and Alexander McQueen have dabbled in the use of such technology to high acclaim. However, it is Katrantzou who really captured my attention because her clothes transform the wearer into a walking collage.

When Katrantzou was first beginning to really be noticed, for her Spring 2011 collection, she was mostly using images of rooms in her designs and adding details like skirts shaped like lamp shades to keep things out of the ordinary. While the collection did leave a lasting imprint on many viewers minds (how could it not?!), it was a little too wacky for people to really want to buy.

In her Fall collection for the same year however, she amped things up, and used Faberge eggs as a motif as well as Chinese pottery. This garnered the same fascination as the collection before, but now the designs were wearable-a perfect combination of art and semi-normalcy. Soon enough her designs could be found on the likes of Anna Dello Russo and Keira Knightley. 

For her Spring 2012 collection, she used a combination of nature (hence the floral comments above!) and man-made images to produce some surprising designs. The meshing of metals and florals is hypnotizing, and if I had bajillions of dollars at my disposal, I would be buying the whole collection.

And THAT is the perfect transition into very exciting news for us mere-middle class consumers—she is doing a collaboration with Topshop coming out this Spring. Praise all spirits that be, we may have some Mary Katrantzou clothes on our hands sometime soon!

AU REVOIR MADAME,

Sarah