Seeing is Believing

I harp on about various designers on the basis of websites, pictures and it’s very rare that I get to see the garments in person.  Not that you can’t be struck by the merits of the garments by digital images but in no way does it compare to seeing the clothes, trying it on in person, seeing the effects as you swish about in front of a mirror, testing different angles and stances.  When I saw the SS07 Osman Yousefzada show in my first London Fashion Week season, I was struck by the deceptive complexity hidden under the seemingly simply dresses. 

So to take it one step further than seeing the clothes in motion in a show, is to touch and try on the clothes in person where you can slowly inspect things and that is exactly what I did yesterday at the Osman Yousefzada sample sale, held at his studio.  Pieces spanning back to his first collection to his SS07 collection were up for grabs and all I’ll say is re: the prices, if you couldn’t make it, you sorely missed out ! 

I was expecting a quiet sample sale in-and-out type affair (this was my lunch hour! but shock of all shocks, lovely Mr Yousefzada himself came to help me select pieces, and ease/squeeze me into his sample size 8’s (too many pies I tells ya!).  As he grabbed piece after piece urging me to try things on, his objective wasn’t for me to take it all in a dramatic-aristo way, but to encourage me to see the cut of his clothes, the fit, the intentions, the way his garments can be manipulated. 

Sadly I didn’t come away with everything I tried on and I was doubly pissed off that I didn’t have my camera but highlights included a space-agey white leather jacket that poofed out in a bubble shape, a black ‘pulling’ skirt (as Osman called it) with a simple fishtail back that basically made my tush look pretty hot (and trust me when I say that my tush is less than perfect).  There was also a form fitting high-necked cream wool dress that fitted like a glove.  Seeing him showing me how to wear certain things made me think that though we come away with things and make it our own, designers themselves have certain intentions with their garments and it’s good to appreciate their angle too.  I think I was must have come across like a self-preening missy as I kept on changing my stance in front of the mirror, but really I was just amazed at the way things fell into place and fitted.  Most certainly a step up from seeing the clothes swishing around in a show… 

Osman’s background as a designer is oft quoted in press as it is rather unconventional – studied at Cambridge, worked in the City for a while before going back to study fashion at CSM – and I think that gives him a different perspective from other designers.  You can see from his work that he is trying to create longevity with his clothes and that is probably why he uses subtle historical and ethnic references in his work (I’m loving the contemporary takes on Joan of Arc/Medieval design in his AW07-8 collection!) to create something that is still contemporary but not ‘of the latest moment’ if you see what I mean.  He is showing on-schedule for the first time in September for SS08 and I look forward to being geekily stunned again in the same way his work floored me at my first show-going season.

Osman was making me wish I had a bottomless bank account as I basically wanted everything I tried on but I came away with…

…a dark blue silk dress that has an attached sheath at the back that I plan to wear with opera length leather gloves and black ankle boots for a tough theatre-going outfit or clash with pastel tones to casualfy it…. 

…I know I know, ANOTHER cape?  But I really couldn’t resist because I missed the boat with the Sharon Wauchob jacket at Bluebird, I had to have this blazer that morphs into different things depending on how I pull up the cape.  I quite like the way the shoulders are very defined when you pull up the cape completely.  Call me sad, but spending hours morphing the jacket is my kinda fun…

…The ‘snood’!  I’ve worn it casually here over a t-shirt, but over a body-con tight is right dress, it sort of adds a childish dimension.  They say childish clothes for this season are banished but I want to be in the ‘snood’… 

…Lastly, the sample sale also yielded some Jenne O silver lace-up shoes (her stuff is seriously sexy….) that actually sits very nicely with the Osman Y stuff…