New York Fashion Week was, by and large, plain—but Phillip D. Johnson managed to spot those who stood out from the rest

Photographed by C. Yohance Deloatch, Cheryl Gorski, Ian Smile and Richard Spiegel

Excerpted from the May 2005 print edition of Lucire

WENTY-TWENTY HINDSIGHT, the saying goes, can make you a genius—even when you are clearly not. I say this partly in jest because one indisputable fact of New York Fashion Week is that while you are in the eye of the storm, your mind’s eye tends to skip over a great deal. You miss the quiet nuances bubbling beneath the surface. You are so busy attending shows, kicking squatters out of your hard-earned seats, exchanging gossip and vital information (which, at the Bryant Park Tents, are one and the same), and trying to keep your physical being from falling into extreme exhaustion that, to bring into play an overused cliché, you miss the forest for the trees.
   The trends from the catwalks can be best summed up as a mixed bag of conflicting ideas. The “trend” one could distinguish was the decided lack of any overwhelming, giant-killing theme. Some designers, who should have known better, chose this season to coast on the fumes of past successes, offering bland, underwhelming retrospective collections. This is not to say they weren’t fine efforts, but please, you are still young. Leave the retrospective exhibitions for future Costume Institute curators at the Metropolitan Museum of Art. Get back to work!
   Other young, up-and-coming designers and those in the middle (on their way to the top) mercifully stepped up their game and really gave us editors something exciting to talk and write about. Case in point is Estaban Cortazar. It was a novelty when he first came on the scene at age 17 with big-name sponsors and backers. Then the novelty wore off. His lack of structured education began to show; and the tide turned a tad. This season, however, he showed remarkable maturity in the execution of his designs and truly impressed some of his harshest critics. In leaving the all-encompassing Latino experience behind, he demonstrated a more international sense of fashion, which played well with the press.
   Designers not included in the first two groups did their jobs and did it very well. Ralph Rucci clearly had the best collection out of New York, bar none. Carolina Herrera continues to evolve into a brand for the future. Her strategy of bringing in her daughters into the business is working beyond all expectations.
   Her collection was youthful yet classy, one every woman with the requisite taste and discretionary funds can embrace. Oscar de la Renta was Oscar and everything was well in the world. This season, with the exception of one collection that stunk up the joint, designers used this time to firm up their base, try out new ideas and lay the groundwork for future exploration and experimentations that will hopefully bear fruit with the spring 2006 collections.

Pump up the volume
A TREND THAT STARTED during the spring 2005 season exploded on the scene this past February: volume. It floated like so many Macy’s Thanksgiving Day Parade balloons on to nearly every runway in the form of layered skirts, dresses, coats, and tops. Some looks, like the ever-familiar Empire-waisted smock dresses, made an appearance on several runways, including Rebecca Taylor’s. Other styles include baby doll tops and dresses that really don’t do justice to any woman and the swirling voluminous skirts—sometimes with embellished jewellery and sparkles—reminded me of Holly Hunter running along the waves in the Academy Award-winning film, The Piano. Skirts, to put not so fine a point on it, were poufed to the nth degree as in Christian Lacroix-1980s pouf, bubbled like crumbled wrapping paper, with peplums. They are best paired with a fitted top at all times, to not have people constantly ask you when your baby is due. In terms of pants, volume was most seen in resort-ready palazzo pants paired with fitted tops (as seen in Kenneth Cole’s show). Stand-out pieces in the coats include pieces from Narciso Rodriguez, Richard Chai and Catherine Malandrino.

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ABOVE, FROM TOP: Oscar de la Renta, Rebecca Taylor, Carolina Herrera, Oscar de la Renta, Kenneth Cole, Narciso Rodriguez, Richard Chai, Catherine Malandrino, Richard Tyler.