Escaping Into Fashion

While you may not be able to control the chaos of world events, you can still rule your own style.

In this age of global uncertainty, clothes have become a kind of panacea for a growing number of consumers. Designers are responding to the political upheavals of the past year by injecting some much-needed humor into women's wardrobes.

Browns CEO Holli Rogers is already predicting that spring's sartorial hit will be Rosie Assoulin's smiley-face T-shirt. This cheery number, which reads "Thank you! Have a Nice Day!" neatly sums up the jubilant mood of the coming season.

We may not be able to control the chaos of world events, but we still rule our own style.

It's no coincidence that a cartoonish aesthetic, of the sort you'd find if you rifled through an eccentric child's dressing-up box, was in plentiful supply on the 2017 spring/summer runways.

Alessandro Michele's army of Gucci geeks displayed growing swagger in garish get-ups that ran from fuzzy crayon-colored furs featuring zebras to tiered, tinsel-y coats that rivaled grandma's Christmas tree.

It was a similar story at Dolce & Gabbana, where sumptuous evening wear was loaded with pasta and pizza motifs, and drums became bags, while Marc Jacobs tore a page from a psychedelic coloring book, covering clothes with the childlike scrawl of the London illustrator Julie Verhoeven. Even ardent minimalists would have to admit that these playful looks have potent pick-me-up power.

For Anya Hindmarch - whose empire is built on feel-good fashion - all this frivolity is nothing new.

"An ironic, lighter and more irreverent approach has always been my thing. People love beautiful objects and increasingly, they want to show their character - that's the point of fashion," she says. "Customers today are more confident with their style. There aren't so many rules. It's about putting a sticker on a beautiful handbag and not being too precious about it."

What's surprising is who is consuming this cartoonish style. Though there's no real rhyme or reason, says Hindmarch, often it's older clients who are investing in the maddest pieces - like her cuddly, googly-eyed Ghost backpack that has also been spotted on Gigi Hadid and Kendall Jenner.

The same is true of the customer for Lebanese designer Mira Mikati's emoji-embellished styles. Though her fans run from their 20s to 50s, at a recent London pop-up one of Mikati's most ardent buyer was an 87-year-old.

Mikati began her career as a buyer, co-founding the upscale Beirut boutique Plum, before launching her own line some four seasons ago - largely out of frustration at the sameness of the mainstream collections.

"I wanted to create something fun and colorful but easy to wear - that you can add to jeans and a white T-shirt, but that's also a conversation point."

Her clothes, worn by Beyonce and Rihanna, are certainly that: pink parrot-appliqued trench coats, scribble-print hooded tops and dresses clad with a family of monsters who spell out her Peter Pan ethos in scrawled speech bubbles that read "Never Grow Up".

According to Roberta Benteler, who founded online fashion emporium Avenue 32 in 2011, it's the cartoon aesthetic that's really piquing women's desire right now.

"Anything that looks like a child's drawing or a toy sells incredibly well," she says. "Brands like Mira Mikati, Vivetta and Les Petits Joueurs inspire the impulse to buy because they're so eye-catching. You have to have it now because there's a sense you won't find it anywhere else."

The exponential rise of street-style stars and social media is playing a part in the popularity of these playful looks.

"Designers are creating for the online world and (the) customer," continues Benteler, who cites the Middle Eastern consumer as a big investor in these niche eccentric designs. "People find escapism in fashion and more than ever they need something to cheer them up."

In practical terms, in an effort to beat the warp speed of high-street copying, designers are differentiating themselves with increasingly intricate and artisanal styles that are harder to mimic. Just because these pieces have a childlike sensibility doesn't mean they're not beautifully crafted.

"My aim is create a handbag that you can keep as a design piece," explains the accessories designer Paula Cademartori. One of her most successful designs - the Petite Faye bag, which comes in a whole rainbow of configurations - takes more than 32 hours to create at her Italian studio.

"Even if the styles are colorful and speak loudly, they're still sophisticated," says Cademartori, whose brand was recently snapped up by the luxury goods group OTB. It can pay to be playful.

One man with a unique insight into the feel-good phenomenon is Marco de Vincenzo, who combines his long-standing role as leather goods head designer at Fendi with creating his own collection.

"When we first created the Fendi monster accessories for bags we were simply playing around," he says of the charms that still loom large some three years on. "The most successful designs are created without pressure, through play."

His own-line debut bag features an animalistic paw.

"It's about creating something new and different for women to discover," he explains. "You buy something because you love it, not because you need it. Fashion is like a game - it has to excite."

(China Daily USA 03/01/2017 page10)