report by linda grant
photography by catwalking.com
If you are on your third or fourth Mary Katrantzou show, you might have forgotten the impact of seeing her for the first time, as I did yesterday morning. Trends, wearable, sculptural, draped – none of the usual fashion words apply to an experience more like spending 15 intense minutes exposed to lavish beauty. Everything was on those fabrics: florals, goldfish, lotus buds. These were dresses as Fabergé eggs – decorative three-dimensional objects that stood away from the body in peplums, cocoon-shapes or a skirt as an open vase delicately holding the abdomen. A sequined skirt was covered with roses, as if the contents of the room had flown to attach themselves to the body. Looking at great beauty on the catwalk, you inevitably have to ask the perennial “wearable” question. But when a woman walks into a room in a Mary Katrantzou dress, she is making a present to everyone in that room, for fashion is a gift not just to the wearer but the visual aesthetic of our surroundings.
