Courtesy Style.com
Gwen Stefani closed out New York fashion week with a show that in running between three decades lost itself. She gave precedent not to the garments but to a giant television behind the runway, rapidly projecting images.
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The backdrop rifled between helicopters over South East Asia, the blitzkrieg and Dr. King's March on Washington. This, she was saying, was the 50s, 60s and 70s. Do you remember it? Do you remember when we desegregated Little Rock? Do you remember the Vietcong and Agent Orange? Yes Ms. Stefani, we do. The over-simplification, bulldozing in its effect, was so forceful it detracted from her collection.
She pranced between soldier, raga muffin and London girls, before moving on to buffalo, mod and glamour looks. Seven or eight girls were bundled together, mostly by race, and walked before she moved on to her next idea. But none of it worked together. Individually, the looks were nice; you can expect Bloomingdale's to be fully stocking the line to fill out its Short Hills and Aventura stores.
Cohesion would have been better though. A Navajo print silk chiffon mini dress was fun. It looked as if the German flag had been deconstructed with a black brocade on top. Some of her layering harked to Rei Kawakubo: patchwork deep v-neck sweaters under oversized wrap coats. The proportions fought each other, and then fought the next batch of looks that came in. Wide leg palazzo pants, tunics and a back bow blouse jumpsuit in silk rounded out the 50 outfit runway presentation — but didn't fit with the tangerine hues shown just before.
When the show ended the backdrop turned to Ms. Stefani — this time set on top of bursts of fire and explosions. Perhaps she forgot Mohamed Bouazizi in Tunisia and what has happened over the past two months, but that image may have been the most arresting one projected. I doubt she meant to wink at the Middle East, but she did. Those 60s era helicopter images at the beginning of the show are still clearly flying today.
