Wunderkind (Q1726)
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German fashion brand
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | Wunderkind |
German fashion brand |
Statements
The Wunderkind revival is slowly taking shape. With a duo of talented creative directors—Louise Friedlaender and Lydia Maurer—now on board, the brand can now go about redefining where it’s going and who its customer is.“The inspiration is really the Berlin woman,” Maurer offered during a recent showroom visit. “It’s a mix of sporty, casual, and elegant. It’s very forward-thinking.” The fashion vibe in the German capital is more casual than in Paris, the designers noted: more Birkenstocks and sneakers, a freewheeling mix of designer and streetwear, practical and feminine, pieces you wear all the time mixed with ones picked up while traveling.Friedlaender has already launched her own label; Maurer launched the swimwear line Phylyda after doing time at Saint Laurent, Paco Rabanne, and Givenchy. Both have lived and worked all over Europe, so they are well placed to understand what cosmopolitan women want to wear.On the racks, there was a sense of über-functionality: Since she’s probably riding a bike, the Berlin woman may be drawn to trousers with elasticized ankles or a double row of ties to keep fabric free of bicycle chains. A windbreaker with a rectangular front pocket looked like a problem-solver for sporty settings—the same style also came in burgundy leather. Ditto the khaki safari coat with a drawstring waist. Some of the tailored pieces looked like stalwarts, for example single-breasted jackets, wrinkle-free separates, or raw denim trousers split up the side to reveal accordion-pleated fabric.In person, their rapport is already seamless enough that they finish each other’s sentences. Likewise, they described the Wunderkind wardrobe as “a patchwork.” For the moment, that’s an apt metaphor—although not necessarily in the sense they meant. Defining what today’s woman really wants takes time. It will be interesting to see how the designers work it through.
2 October 2018
Last fall, Hugo Boss alum Peter Kappler became CEO of the label originally founded by Wolfgang Joop and rebooted the creative direction “with a Berlin spirit.” By that, he means a look that might be described as brutalist chic: It’s less romantic-edgy than a Parisian sensibility and definitely less quirky than London, but also slightly less hard-nosed than New York. Most of all, it means that the brand is not keen on showcasing a “hero designer.” In Kappler’s book, those days are over.From now on, the label will be an organic collective of wunderkinder that, in addition to its core design team, includes talents across creative fields such as music and art as well as fashion. “Twenty years ago, I would never have predicted the influence music has today,” Kappler noted. “The same goes for art and digital. You can’t separate them anymore. We have great talents in Berlin, and we want to approach fashion from the other end, and give them the chance to express themselves.” Other than bringing Marc Goehring on board for styling, Kappler wasn’t naming names.That’s admirable and also slightly disappointing. It would be nice to call out whoever cuts those trousers. For its first reboot collection, Wunderkind delivered the kind of separates that lots of women are forever casting about for—the silk shirt that’s not too masculine, not too feminine, sometimes with a bit of stretch, in colors like sage or silvery beige or pops of color; a top in layers of mesh that nods to a trend without recklessness; a leather skirt that’s quietly assertive; or a print that speaks softly (this season, there be dragons). A crisp coat in blue or ecru leather with shearling conveyed affluence without looking braggy, though it clearly owed a debt to a certain Paris indie. Wunderkind is fishing for the kind of Céline customer who could be hedging her bets these days. If they play it right, they just might lure her in.
6 March 2018
First came Miuccia's bananas, then Stella's lemons. Today, Wolfgang Joop had cherries. So, what is it with fruit this season? If nothing else, it's safe to say that these are all designers whose senses of humor are fully intact. In Joop's case, that also came across in the models' kooky striped body stockings and their exaggeratedly high platform wedges.Apparently, the designer was inspired by a Portuguese garden, so in addition to those cherries, he had the most exuberantly colorful floral prints of the season, and that's saying something (see Jil Sander; Akris). They appeared on crinolined baby-doll dresses, over which Joop layered jackets haphazardly topstitched with contrasting thread. That detail almost looked like sutures. As the show progressed, he spliced his prints into the shoulder seams of one blazer and along the rear seams of another. By the end, the backs of jackets consisted of crisscrossing strips of pinstripes, khaki, and patterned chiffon. Joop's message seemed to be about the irrepressibility of nature. A little too irrepressible, in fact, as it appeared on his runway. His tailoring was as impeccable as it was imaginative, but it would take some serious pruning to make most of the looks in this show ready for real life.
5 October 2010
It's ironic that Wolfgang Joop, who once made his living putting men and women in power suits, has become such a maximalist. For Fall, he appeared to have looked to Spain or perhaps the Argentine pampas for inspiration. The first outfit featured a striped and fringed horse blanket tossed over the shoulders, and from there Joop went on to turn those blankets into all manner of blazers and trenchcoats, with leather buckle closures and fringe lining the arm seams. But as strange as they sound, they worked; he can still cut a mean jacket. There was also a good-looking shearling aviator and cool leather perfectos cropped high underneath the armholes.On the more feminine side of the story, the designer showed draped scarf-print dresses trimmed with fur in a manner that echoed what Galliano had done earlier in the week. Other frocks came with large, multilayered accordion-pleated ruffs at the shoulders or heavily scalloped yokes, which gave them a costume-y sensibility out of step with the season. There were some decent outerwear pieces here, but now would've been an opportune moment for Joop to have fully re-engaged with the tailoring that was once such an integral part of his oeuvre.
9 March 2010
Wolfgang Joop named his Spring collection "Hurt and Heal." His program notes explained that "after a time of opulence and carelessness, healing has to come." He's not the only designer thinking along those lines; unfortunately, Joop's Wunderkind show took the sentiment way too literally.Rendered in red or blue toile de Jouy, his blouses, high-waisted pants, peasant dresses, and coats had a country charm that ought to have put him in good company—Karl Lagerfeld himself went bucolic at Chanel. But there was a major disconnect between these clothes and the futuristic knits they were layered upon. Inspired by medical compression body stockings designed to enhance circulation, the unitards came in graphic color-blockings: red, white, and black, with large yellow arrows pointing at the bust or the nether regions. The metal back braces that accompanied some of the looks just added to the head-scratching effect.
6 October 2009
Wolfgang Joop's Fall Wunderkind collection was inspired by Suprematism, the early-twentieth-century Russian abstract art movement founded by Kazimir Malevich, as well as by the work of contemporary German artist Gregor Törzs. The results are a strong argument that art is often better left on walls. Malevich's rectangle and square paintings became the basis for a colorful geometric print that appeared on chiffon dresses. Worn with matching tights or sequined leggings stitched in the same graphic pattern, the frocks were quite an eyeful. Törzs' depictions of cheetahs and deer, meanwhile, were printed onto wool coats, which detracted from the garments rather than elevating them. In fact, the strongest looks in the collection were the first ones to hit the runway. These showed Joop's prowess as a tailor, and, with their padded hips and on-trend forties power shoulders, suggested he does possess the ability to design relevant clothes.
10 March 2009
Wolfgang Joop is Paris' resident eccentric. He brought the zany once again for Spring, following up last season's space romp with a collection that was more grown-up but barely less whimsical. He said his frame of reference was the sculptor/architect Isamu Noguchi and pre- and postwar Japan. That explained the olive-drab, military-inspired cargo jackets and pants that he paired with multicolored rose-print blouses, and, somewhat more tangentially, a butterfly superimposed on a checked chiffon that he used for floaty, away-from-the-body dresses. The line connecting those Eastern references and, say, his lace-doily numbers was a bit fuzzier; for quirkiness, he hit the jackpot with a white coat in the frilly stuff. If you didn't ask yourself too many questions about the viability of Joop's creations—multicolor polka-dot suit, anyone?—this stream-of-consciousness collection was an amusing ride.
3 October 2008
Wolfgang Joop's space-age set—a pair of giant, pulsing half-spheres around which the models walked—was straight out of2046, the Kar Wai Wong sci-fi film. The clothes themselves were moreLolita. Well, not exactly, but this was Joop's youngest-feeling Wunderkind collection yet, full of neon-bright prints, fabric collages, and mini lengths, all accessorized with ankle boots and opaque tights, or the occasional pair of insane fluorescent-beaded leggings.His tweedy bouclé three-piece suits (that's jacket, cropped pants, and mini) came with the exaggerated shoulders that always indicate a designer has the future on his mind. The shoulders carried over into shifts patchworked from quilted yokes, plaid underlayers, and printed chiffons. The lineup's star attractions were a knitted fur coat playfully embellished with tufts of neon Tibetan lamb and a couple of graffiti dresses, one ruched and tiered and to the knee, and the other a loose tent that was longer in back than in front. What his futuristic Lolitas have to do with last season's luxe bohos is anybody's guess, but it looked like Joop had fun dreaming up his pastiche, and as offbeat as it was, it did include plenty of cute pieces.
29 February 2008
If Janis Joplin and Ziggy Stardust had met and run amok in one another's closet, they might've come up with something like Wolfgang Joop's Spring collection. In a departure from both last season's Edwardian tailoring and the severe menswear for which he has such a predilection, Joop went for no-holds-barred glam rock with a boho twist. He layered intricate leopard-spot beadwork over ikat prints, acid satin blazers over dhoti pants, and sporty anoraks over smock dresses—showing it all with wedge platforms worn with colorful ankle socks and the occasional woven fedora. Decorating the edges of coats and jackets, meanwhile, was a red floral bandanna print borrowed from the scarf Joop tied around his neck to take his bow."It all started with this," he said, pointing to the bandanna afterward. "In the beginning, I wanted a West Coast feeling, something natural. But it ended up so crazy, you can't get arrested." Crazy, maybe, but totally in keeping with one of Spring's prevailing trends: seventies bohemianism. In his third season in Paris, Joop has at last struck the right balance between chic and whimsical, and it made for a lighthearted, fun show.
1 October 2007
You couldn¿t help but feel a twinge of déjà vu: This was the second Paris showing for the peripatetic Wolfgang Joop, and it was an improvement on his first, but at times it felt like too unsubtle an homage to Alexander McQueen—from the models¿ frizzed and upswept hair down to the handkerchief hems of the bias-cut and asymmetrically draped frocks. Among the more obvious references were chiffon dresses with soft little bustles at the lower back and pleats fanning out from upside-down U-shaped seaming at the torso.Like McQueen, Joop enjoys a bit of severe tailoring, and this collection had that, too, in the form of a black peaked-shoulder double-breasted jacket worn with a wrap skirt and net underlay, and coats so minutely studded with beads that they resembled shagreen. He isn't the first designer to propose jodhpurs this season, but that doesn't mean women are likely to go for them. On the other hand, a forties-ish dress with almost New Look proportions was a winner. Joop smartly lightened up on the accessories in general, but those PVC tights, especially in prophylactic nude, were a definite don¿t.
25 February 2007
After two years in New York, Wolfgang Joop has brought his Wunderkind collection to Paris. "In America, they were always telling me you have to be a little businesslike, a little sporty, a little realistic. Here, you have to follow your heart," he said. Well, it seems that Joop's heart is of two minds. The first look out—a two-piece, gray checked suit with slouchy pants—suggested he'd go the menswear route. From there, though, he layered on the flourishes, so that by the end it wasn't a surprise to see a long-coat-bikini top-and-cuffed-bloomers combination come in gold-leafed tablecloth lace. Most of the clothes were faded at the shoulders, an ombré patina effect Joop said he achieved by bleaching them in the sun in Italy. Many others were studded with brass grommets. When he put the two effects together, it was an embellishment overload. Better were the show's less tricky pieces: a belted black dress with broderie anglaise at the neckline and a navy silk suit with zips at the ankle that jibed with the sporty vibe starting to materialize on the runways; or washed-leather jackets with a snug, sexy fit. Beforehand, Joop hinted that his Paris debut had given him a case of the nerves. Nothing suggested that more than the show's misguided statement accessories: bonnets with peripheral-vision-obliterating brims. So much for New York's lesson in realism, indeed.
30 September 2006
Some interesting things are happening at Wolfgang Joop's Wunderkind. The theme of his fall show was "a return to order after the First World War," and that translated into the sort of dark, yet somehow hopeful, mood that we've witnessed on other runways. The Wunderkind aesthetic is grown-up and luxurious, but it can also be rigorous, as evidenced by the strong, forties-like peaked shoulders that added sharpness to a gray suit and a shawl-collar coat. Luxury came in many forms; a batiked patchwork mink coat stood out. Joop's exercises in layering were less consistent: An apron skirt and caplet jacket worn over a shirtdress, for example, didn't really work. That wasn't the only time the designer veered off course, but all in all, this season found him tapping successfully into fashion's prevailing Zeitgeist, in a stylized and luxe way that is all his own.
9 February 2006
Wolfgang Joop is in some ways a prisoner of his name. The inspired Wunderkind collection Joop showed today in the tents deserved a fresh look, with an eye unbiased by the designer's first heyday, in the eighties and nineties. It was truly an exercise in sophisticated, highly accomplished design. Though Joop is no longer emerging, his collection is, with its progression in crescendo.That is not to say that it was perfect. It suffered from a surfeit of ideas and, in passionate, operatic moments of layered flou, edged into Stevie Nicks territory. The standout moments, like a white canvas pantsuit worn by Tiiu Kuik, compensated for the weaker links.Post-show, the designer talked about his lasting attachment to the painters Jean-Antoine Watteau and Gustav Klimt and their "hunger for upper-class romance." The idea of appetite took interesting form in the collection, which picked up on the tablecloth theme making its way through New York fashion week. The finale dress of lace silk was cut like a circular table cover, Joop explained, though it's not obvious at first glance. And dimensional cuffs referenced eighteenth-century napkin-stuffed sleeves.Table linens aside, menswear was also a strong theme worked into the show via striped shirtings, tie silks, baggy proportions, and fantastic pleat-front shirtdresses. It was the perfect antidote to romance, which was present everywhere, and a nice counterpoint to lace-front and embroidered Romanian-style blouses, as was an English-rose print worked into long dresses with intricate braiding insets. Wunderkind (with the awkward growing pains behind him), indeed.
14 September 2005
At Wolfgang Joop's sophomore New York show, each model was followed down the dark runway with a spotlight, creating an intimate focus on the clothes and showcasing, the designer said, "the investment of workmanship in each piece." And what workmanship it was. A majority of the looks, like a sand-colored suede dress worn with flats or a flouncy taffeta number paired with ballerina-style pumps, featured meticulous piecework in an abstract wave pattern that captured the designer's concept for the collection: movement. "Fashion is not art," he said. "It comes alive when someone is wearing it. And in New York —where the designer lives in Bill Blass's former apartment—there is no rest."A red taffeta coat popped; tweed toppers had oversize buttons and fur trim; and a coat of sheared fur, dyed navy, had all the subtleness of velvet. Joop's technical virtuosity was better spent on the dressy pieces than on some of the tweedy daywear which, when pieced and deconstructed, tended to get bulky. For the most part, though, this was a collection that reflected a designer in cool control of his talent.
9 February 2005
Forget all prior associations between Wolfgang Joop and heavy-handed mid- to late-nineties antics. The designer, who sold his eponymous label three years ago, returned to New York this season with a collection, Wunderkind Couture, that was an exercise in modern lightness. Described as "luxury ready-to-wear," the line runs from casual looks (a sheer wrap dress worn over a white tank sheath) and into evening, where the rose-print dresses overlaid with black were unexpectedly dramatic. Blazers and pantsuits aplenty will please executive women, and the fashion-forward will eat up the coats and jackets in gold and silver. When he keeps it light, Joop showed he still has a Midas touch.
13 September 2004