Christopher Kane LFW Fall 2010 – My pick of the bunch!

I have been meaning to update my blog with a review of Christopher Kane's Autumn/Winter 2010 collection for a while, so my apologies for my blogging absence!

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For London fashion week, the Christopher Kane 'woman' has once again shifted identity. Kane says farewell to his Lolita phase - the sickly sweet pastels, gingham and checked prints were tossed aside for what appeared to be a foray into a darker world of leather-clad "juvenile delinquents" and religious cultism.

Never one to pander to expectations, Kane's designs were visually impactful due to the jarring fusion of matte or patent black leather and PVC, contrasted with bead/gem embellishment and embroidered flowers that resembled parochial Women's Institute craftwork.


Kane cites the robes of the Vatican and Priscilla Presley “before Elvis got his hands on her" as two sources of strong inspiration for the collection. His desire to convey a perversion and irony in this collection has been deftly pulled off, through his unusual and somewhat scandalous splicing of the prim and proper with 'bad girl' rebellion.


However, although I am a huge Christopher Kane fan, I feel like I have developed a 'love-hate' relationship with the actual garments from the show. There are elements of the collection that I love and those that I really dislike:

The good:
(The simple feminine cuts, subtler gem detailing and lace panelling work for me.)

The bad:
(Check out that fur and leather abomination and the scary leather collar shirts!)

Emma Watson and Carey Mulligan have been snapped sporting pieces from Kane's Fall collection, but do you think they did the designs justice?


I think Emma rocks her Kane dress - I have always liked the way that he plays on the idea of underwear as outerwear, so the weird leather/flower combo is less accosting. I'm not feeling Carey Mulligan's outfit though, as it is a tad catholic school-girl gone wild!

So, what do you think of the collection as a whole? In my humble opinion, the collection is very interesting - it is unpredictably avant-garde and authoritative in its execution, but its commercial wearability remains strongly in question. I love the lace panelling that remains a signature for Kane and the lace-up leather heels are great! I especially like these lace-up gladiator shoes with gem detailing (I would buy those if I had the cash!):

Clip from the show:



All I'm wondering is...what will Kane do next?!

je-suis-style
xox

(With thanks to Nytimes.com, fabsugar.co.uk, ssense.com and mylifetime.com for the pictures.)