LOVE LFW: Trust This

So okay, I don't want to be a traitor to my generation and all but I don't get how guys dress today. I mean, come on, it looks like they just fell out of bed and put on some baggy pants and take their greasy hair – ew – and cover it up with a backwards cap and like, we're expected to swoon? I don't think so.

Referencing Cher from Clueless isn't fashion brain surgery.  In fact, it can border on inanely repetitve if you've looked at one too many tumblr blogs where the same screenshot gets circulated.  Thankfully for Louise Gray, the quote was worked into the opening of the soundtrack and didn't actually permeate the collection in terms of aesthetic influence.  Instead, what the quote did bring to Gray's S/S 12 'Trust Me' collection was the message to all, that it's definitely ok to "betray your generation", go out on a limb and not run with whatever the majority style tribe might be into. 

Whilst there were no Cher-check ensembles, there were a few opening tweed outfits with neon flecks woven in, that heralded something new for Gray.  I hesitate to say 'grown-up'.  Do I want Louise Gray to grow up?  Well ok, SHE, the person can (female Peter Pan, she isn't…) but the clothes?  I'll take evolution or enrichening and this collection definitely felt enrichened.  The tweed trench in particular panelled with PVC felt like the perfect segue for someone who hasn't been Gray-ified to go into Gray-land.  That's Gray, by name and not by nature as followers of her work will know. 

I know season in, season out, I make the case for Lousie Gray, crying out like a crazed banshee that her clothes will make the world a better place.  Trust ME, as an advocate and active wearer, the world does seem a whole lot rosier when a bit of Louise Gray is on my back.  Then again, I'm that naive that an embroidered dress in an amazing colour palette with lots of jingly jangle bits will somehow makes things ok.  Well, it might make SOME things ok.  Beyond the clothes, the very thing that Gray sends out are these feel-good vibes that make you think that fashion NOT stuck up its own arse and having a laugh is definitely something we need more of.   

Still, if there wasn't a dramatic change-up in the way Gray puts together colours, embellishment and fabrics, then there were definite tweaks in the styling.  Gray's S/S 12 collection went HD, where you can very clearly pick out the layers – a shirt from a dress, a jacket from a top, a jumper from a short.  All of that can only help Gray go that bit further in making her clothes an on-the-street reality beyond the few that can get hold of her clothes through personal means.  I particularly heart ASOS for supporting Gray through both collaboration and by buying her mainline, and long may that continue.

After this de-cluttering process, I somehow began to draw a parallel between Louise Gray and say Dries Van Noten, which only came to me this season.  Hold up there whilst I defend that slightly eye-brow raising comparison.  Gray's preoccupation with surface detail mixed with a print element has me thinking of a Dries taking a trip or two and getting super tanked-up.  Not a bad thing to have going on seeing as there aren't that many that print mixes quite like Van Noten, and there are not that many that have such a boisterous time whilst doing it.  

Bouncing about in shoes that don't require Boots blister gel plasters is now pretty much part of the deal at Louise Gray and these ones made by Nicholas Kirkwood should make a lot of flatform fans a happy bunch.