|
The fun, he said in our post-show interview,
was in ‘the mixing of the fabrics’ and the ‘attention to colour.’
This season’s combination of plaids, woolens, tweeds and cashmeres,
while greatly extending his vision, certainly made for one of the
most cohesive, tightly edited collection of his career so far—a
point Women’s Wear Daily so aptly pointed out in its first-ever
full length critique of any of his collections. He opened the show
with a four-pocket shooting jacket in camel brown window-pane plaid
and a matching mid-calf Gore skirt that could easily switch roles
and serve as an equally appropriate daytime suit for the office
or out for lunch with the other social X-rays. He followed that
look with a youthful fox fur hooded vest in the same camel brown
window-pane plaid with a matching belted trouser and a heather wool
plaid riding jacket with sueded shoulder patches and hand-shaved
bone buttons paired with a fitted front button flap pant. Another
example of his seamless pairing of hunting style "gear"
with high fashion was his heather grey fox fur four-pocket cinched
jacket with matching belted trouser.
For evening, he demonstrated the lightest touch
possible when infusing the riding theme into his designs. If anything,
this is where he showed the most improvement in his growth as a
designer. I especially liked his multi-colour silk chiffon dress
bound on the waist by a black raffia waist-cincher, his Cornelia
Guest-worthy halter-top bias tornado dress in chocolate plaid silk
chiffon and ultra-versatile olive and charcoal geometric plaid knee-length
(silk lined) coat with hand-shaved bone buttons.
The fact that he is still on a learning curve
does not take anything away from this truly refined take-off of
citified country living. I wasn’t entirely enamoured with his silver
lace with scalloped hem cocktail dress and its matching fox fur
cape, nor did I see how his hip-length double-breasted cape coat
in window-pane plaid advance the theme of this collection. The former
was simply too many elements piled on top of each other and the
latter just gave off that musty smell of "old". It is
to his credit that he managed to, with this collection, please most
of the people most of the time, instead of the opposite: pleasing
almost no one all of the time.
Mr Valley sees his collections as ‘a continuation
of a story, that of which [one hopes] to write a new chapter every
season.’ And he should be very proud of his continued success in
the market-place and in the battle to capture the hearts and minds
of the very tough-minded and fashion-savvy female customer in New
York City and beyond.
The inspiration he got from designing this fall
collection also gave birth to a fabulous and warmly received mini-collection
of shoes. Staying within the above-mentioned hunting theme, the
shoes are all ‘very masculine and with many English touches such
as wing tips and tassles.’ To say that every woman who attended
his show and have seen these shoes in his showroom wants to own
a pair or two would be the greatest of understatements. ‘In fact,’
he reported in our conversation, ‘I am getting an equal amount of
inquiries from my customers and the store buyers abut the shoes
as I am about the collection in general, which is the biggest surprise
of all.’
He has just signed a licence deal for a new line
of jeans, Valley Jeans, which, as anyone with one iota of knowledge
about the fashion business knows, is an important piece of the puzzle
in any designer’s business plan.
‘The jeans are amazing,’ he said. ‘And I am in
love with them. I love the fabrication and the washes, the details,
everything. And under the scrutiny of my fit, I believe it will
be a great venture.’ •
Phillip D. Johnson is features’ editor of
Lucire.
|
     
The fact that he is still
on a learning curve does not take anything away from this truly
refined take-off of citified country living
|
@