AGATHA’S HEARTFELT DEDICATION TO COLORFUL CHEERFULNESS
Fall Winter 2012-13
February 1, 2014
Madrid, Spain – Color. Color and more color. Color block, fluo, vivid contrast and heart-shapes appear all over the place in the new collection. These were maybe the keywords of the Agatha Ruiz de la Prada Fall/Winter 2012/2013 show we saw yesterday. Once again, Spain’s most prominent and world-renown fashion designer surprised and amused the crowd of international editors, buyers, celebrity friends and supporters who gathered to welcome another impressive collection that features all the key elements that made Agatha’s label – a household name known all over the world, featuring an all-encompassing range of items shifting from womenswear to accessories, shoes, bags, beachwear, eyewear and so on.
This collection is typical Agatha, packed with the classic silhouettes characteristic of the brand and featuring an outlook that is comfortable, practical and extremely cheerful.
The outfits were defined by geometric patterns of large volume and extremely pure lines tumbling down the body, endowing both the material and the wearer with considerable freedom of movement. Here we come across some very simple and practical straight cuts that form part of the designer’s classic range of shapes, whilst patterns that remain as fashionable today as they did when they first appeared have evolved just enough to meet the needs of the woman of today. We saw coats featuring volume at the back and oversize silhouettes, together with smoking jackets, trousers cut wide in the leg, knitwear items that follow the line of the body, wide jumpsuits, straight dresses and evasé skirts. And yet Agatha’s funny and irreverent shows up in the bi-colored stockings (one leg in acid yellow, the other one in bright orange), bi-colored platform shoes that look like a mouthwatering layered cake in fuchsia and yellow, and most definitely in the eye-popping, Lady Gaga-esque bright pink faux fur with impossibly broad shoulders that made the crowd clap in delight.
As for the materials, wool, cotton and silk will predominate this season, including woolen knitwear, crêpe and woolen cloth with cashmere, cotton felt with and without lurex, leggings brightly colored denim pants and, of course, prints in the form of stripes, dots and hearts. Silk will take on many guises, soft and weighty and flowing, or in the form of reinforced faille and duchesse. As always, experimental fabrics have a role to play in this world, including neoprene effects, tulle fringe trimming, pleating featuring relief-work in the form of hearts and stars, feathers and sequins. An example of that experimentation could be one of the final dresses with long stripes of contrasting fabric (e.g.: yellow over orange) attached to the back of the skirt so to form a long trail. A typically Agatha’s tongue-in-cheek reference to pompous red carpet gowns, we may assume.
Colors, needless to say, were the showstoppers of the fashion show: as always, the range was extensive and varied, featuring strong hot and cold contrasts and a series of more winter shades, including red, violet, turquoise, fuchsia and intense blue, red and pistachio. Especially the last one was used to create a sexy tuxedo in silk shantung, with heart-shaped high relief pockets on the front. All in all, a real sensation, a veritable luxury of visual emotions that enthuse and entertain in order to brighten up the cold winter months.
