London Fashion Week is quite possibly the biggest event on every fashionistas calendar. Whilst the fashion elite gather for four days of scrupulous fashion analysis and meticulous style advice in order to uncover the most up-to-date trends, all eyes descend on London Fashion Weekend to filter these trend elitisms down to us mere mortals, waiting tentatively for our chance to shop the must-haves and get in on the action.
Somerset house plays host to fashion biggest consumer showcase twice a year. This season, I was invited back to attend on the Saturday and took along my mum along for a girly day out. The Halston Heritage designer catwalk was definitely one of the biggest highlights, as it was living proof a solid identity combined with creative risk and out-of-the-box ideas can make for a pretty enticing brand. Now many of you may not believe the garments seen below are anything particularly extraordinary (apart from them being b-e-a-utifully designed and made), but as one of Americas most iconic fashion houses, Halston Heritage and it’s founder, Roy Frowick Halston, are credited with reinventing such classics as the jumpsuit, shirtdress and kaftan. This means that at the time, these sorts of shapes were pretty revolutionary and changed the way women were perceived and how they dresses. It was the true vision of one man that meant the brand formed partnerships with artists such as Andy Warhol in the 70’s, thus giving signature silhouettes a modern spin and this in itself is quite an outstanding achievement. I do love a bit of fashion-meets-art talk, (seeing as I wrote my entire dissertation on the evolution of fashion and art in contemporary culture, I guess I could get a little carried away so I apologise in advance..) and although its a topic that is often commonly discussed, it is also one that will never be exhausted.
The Halston Heritage AW15 collection was showcased on the London Fashion Weekend catwalk to the delight of a packed out audience, and many mums who (like mine) could probably remember the iconic brand back in the day. With the comeback of seventies chic, there was no better time or place to show off the collection, and so we prepared ourselves for a lesson in fashion’s history as well as fashion’s future.
Minimal Extravagance was the order of the day, with whimsical fabrics and fluid colours contributing to the paired down colour palette. Beautiful tumbling silhouettes and soft fabric structures meant each outfit was suitably styled and ready-to-wear without an accessory in sight. I was torn between the floaty aquatic kaftan (which was beautiful and bold but still delicate) and the more structured and formal white maxi dress, yet each outfit oozed a pure elegance that was undoubtably what made it stand out all those years ago, and it’s definitely still got it!