What initially
drew my attention to the Creatures of the Wind Fall 2013 collection was
the crimson red walls and spotlights lending a rainbow spectrum to the
carpet. That seems pretty stupid considering I should be more enthused
about the ~clothes~ and how ~pretty~ everything is, but
the whole thing reminded me of Agent Cooper's lucid dreams in Twin Peaks
and the Autumn tones makes me think of The Royal Tenenbaums too. That
sense of nostalgia eased me into the visual experience of the clothes
themselves, which I found scintillating and perfect because Creatures of
the Wind is totally perfect. I was engrossed in the colours of their
Spring 2012 collection, and there's still that delicious confusion and
eclecticism uniting everything together but for Fall the tones are more
muted, restrained and clean. Tavi Gevinson mentioned a previous
Creatures of the Wind collection as having the perfect balance of
feminine and masculine tones, and that becomes conspicuous with the
addition of tacky, decorated, beige ties.
The ties in
themselves are worth mentioning- like long lost brethren to ties from
your father's collection, but improved upon with the use of embellished,
glamorous Swarovski crystals arranged into flowers. The ties are
everywhere in this collection but subtle enough to, lurk in the
background like a 1940s gangster and omnipresent in a sea of long hair
and skinny stiletto heels. I'm more accustomed to more striking
masculine tones borrowed from modern boyfriend-style of wide legged
pants, big jaunty shoulders in a Comme Des Garcons kind of way and
thickened eyebrows in eyeliner; rather than this incorporation and
blending of both spheres of gender. I quite like this understated, quiet
use of ties which makes the statement zippers zippers at the front of
the dresses somehow normal in a way. I suppose I just never really got
into using zippers as some great statement in clothing especially at the
front because that just seems so harsh and open.
The tone of the
collection also seems nostalgic of sitting in a 1960s decorated lounge
room, but it's missing the musty stained carpet, frozen TV dinner tray
table and wooden paneled television set. And viewing the whole
collection seems like a synaesthetic experience when listening to Frank
Ocean's 'Forest Gump' from his Channel Orange record. Everything seems
related to tones of red and orange, staying at an elderly person's house
and The Greater Chain of Being. I think that's something every designer
should now aspire to because old people are great and should be
treasured like long lost ties to the past. This has nothing to do with
my exploitation of my boyfriend's family or getting to hang out with his
grandma with the promise of eventually learning how to knit, crochet
and borrow a sewing machine- all while drinking very milky cups of tea
and eating bags of ugly reject biscuits. It's totally great, but
somehow I just need to remember music in my head rather than playing
Frank Ocean on my phone (which would seem rude and totally annoying).
I also got
serious Twin Peaks vibes from the amount of plaid, long coats and high
heels; more precisely referencing the clothes of the townsfolk working
at the small town gas station combined with Audrey's
daily ritual of changing from saddle shoes to red kitten heels at her
school locker. The truth is that many modern-day small towns lack this
glamour but still have plenty of flannelet shirts abound, but it's nice
to daydream and romanticise remote areas like Peter Weir's
'Picnic at Hanging Rock', Enid's ability to find God in tacky things
like a bad comedian and 1950s inspired diner and The Virgin Suicides.
The silhouettes also seem to echo the clean lines and practical American
style cited by former American Vogue editor Grace Mirabella as
instrumental in Western fashion and culture. I find it difficult to
encounter clothes that are both straightforward in design but have the
aesthetic of 'Lucy in the Sky with Diamonds' in my everyday life, but
browsing Style.com in my room does make me hopeful that there is a whole other world out there for me.
Tavi also
mentioned a previous Creatures of the Wind collection as being
untraceable in origins, and I think that statement can be generalised to
the entire universe that the designers have created. She was speaking
specifically about their Spring 2013 collection with its thrift store
origins and French lace from a couturier, but I get lost in the mix of
strange front zippers, collars and blazers in the same multidimensional
sense. It's nostalgic and yet new all at once, which again makes
me feel super connected to the universe and able to understand complicated concepts like time travel and other groovy things. Speaking
of time warps, the sunglasses are a commercial first for the brand and
seem somehow early 2000s/ Avant Garde in origins (disappointingly not as
majestic or sparkly as the famed Creatures of the Wind headpiece featured as the background to their website) but that strange lens shape and colour seems joyously disconnected from the clothes themselves.
Creatures of
the Wind have delivered another technicolour dream experience with an
eagle eye when it comes to detail. Despite the magical interplay of
reds, orange, beige and black the collection does seem more mature and
restrained; less Gene
Wilder as Willy Wonka but more strange citizen, Log Lady from Twin
Peaks and that general setting of a seedy, backwater town as a point of
origin. Without getting to touch and play with the clothes in person I
can only make so many assumptions about the textures, but I can reveal I
really want to buy Dollar Store gemstones and decorate many plaid ties.
If you take anything else away from my review, Creatures of the Wind
seems to be inching towards more of the commercial world and getting
their foot in the door as a serious contender for fashion houses but
each piece is made by hand with love in a tangled spiderweb of old
stories, past and present.
What initially
drew my attention to the Creatures of the Wind Fall 2013 collection was
the crimson red walls and spotlights lending a rainbow spectrum to the
carpet. That seems pretty stupid considering I should be more enthused
about the ~clothes~ and how ~pretty~ everything is, but
the whole thing reminded me of Agent Cooper's lucid dreams in Twin Peaks
and the Autumn tones makes me think of The Royal Tenenbaums too. That
sense of nostalgia eased me into the visual experience of the clothes
themselves, which I found scintillating and perfect because Creatures of
the Wind is totally perfect. I was engrossed in the colours of their
Spring 2012 collection, and there's still that delicious confusion and
eclecticism uniting everything together but for Fall the tones are more
muted, restrained and clean. Tavi Gevinson mentioned a previous
Creatures of the Wind collection as having the perfect balance of
feminine and masculine tones, and that becomes conspicuous with the
addition of tacky, decorated, beige ties. 
