Duro Olowu (Q2975)
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Duro Olowu is a fashion house from FMD.
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | Duro Olowu |
Duro Olowu is a fashion house from FMD. |
Statements
You can hear a Duro Olowu presentation before you see it. Walking up the stairs to the apartment he borrowed from a friend to show his clothes this season—the interiors a maximalist riot of patterns and prints wholly befitting Olowu’s own eye for clashing extremes—you could hear the peals of laughter echoing down the corridor as the designer regaled the assembled crowd of editors with the stories behind each piece. “Sometimes people say, how come we end up laughing so much at these previews?” Olowu added. “Well, I think if you’re not laughing, you’re not having fun.”If there was an operative word within Olowu’s spring collection, it was certainlyfun—but while there are plenty of looks to put a smile on your face, the technical rigor behind each piece is no laughing matter. A trio of tailored opening outfits in a blazing sunflower yellow—a trench coat cut just so at the calf, and a pair of pantsuits, one roomy, one cinched—were cleverly configured to be mixed and matched at will. A 1920s-inspired coat and a series of separates and swishy dresses featured an especially lovely striped print that Olowu likened to the endpapers you might find in Victorian books, patchworked in contrasting colors and meticulously seamed together on the diagonals where the points of the bias meet. “I wanted that familiarity but still that strangeness,” said Olowu. “It’s about taking a delicate pattern and making it quite bold.”There was plenty more boldness to come: multi-print bias dresses with ravishing clashes of romantic florals and geometric block prints, or with ruffled trims on the sleeves; knee-length coats with kick flare black slub silk trousers poking out from underneath to dance around the models’ ankles; boxy duster coats with playful polka-dot buttons; and an especially dazzling jacket cut from a wild combination of gold lamé, chenille, and raffia. “I wanted each piece to feel like its own living, pulsating thing,” Olowu said.As always, however, look a little closer—beyond the kaleidoscopic mish-mash of florals and polka-dots and rowdy prints—and every detail was rooted in Olowu’s obsession with practicality. The hoodies he introduced last season proved to be a surprise hit among his art world-adjacent clientele, and they made a return here, styled with nothing but a pair of sandals.
A supremely elegant take on a bomber jacket, featuring precisely cut bell sleeves, is likely to be this season’s best-seller, and the dressed-up-but-laid-back look of a sleeveless, paneled tuxedo jacket and trousers was so winning it elicited a sharp intake of breath from the assembled editors. “It’s about turning it down, but revving it up,” the designer said. If anyone can translate that seemingly paradoxical sentiment into beautiful clothes, it’s Olowu.
2 December 2024
After weeks of endless gray drizzle in London (but what’s new about that), it was a tonic to step into Duro Olowu’s colorful world on a particularly gloomy Tuesday afternoon. Seated inside a friend’s flat within a historic Chelsea apartment block, and with the blazing colors of an abstract Marina Adams painting as a backdrop, Olowu was ready to unveil his fall collection in his own, inimitable style. Namely, with a pair of models parading his latest set of maximalist sartorial confections through the living room, as Olowu himself provided a running commentary.Except, this time around, Olowu’s starting point wasn’t a film or a book (as it typically is) but rather, a mood. While there were still plenty of flashes of his signature eye-popping prints, the print that recurred most was one of multi-colored stripes, which Olowu deliberately desaturated through a process he compared to color-grading a movie; more specifically, he referenced the idea of taking the Technicolor of Powell and Pressburger’sThe Red Shoesand dialing it back to something more muted. “I didn’t want it to feel too loud,” Olowu said. “It’s about ease and self-assurance.”This care and precision—and ease—was visible in the meticulous construction of every piece: ’50s-inspired leopard-print car coats with plenty of satisfying swish; a striped shawl-collar shirt and pleated skirt set, fitted to ensure every stripe lined up perfectly, even across the cinched waist; coats cut from a feather-light, textured silk rayon to double up as a dress in the summer; peasant-sleeve gowns cut from a riot of artfully clashing patterns, seamed together from vintage Italian fabrics and prints of Olowu’s own design. Perhaps the most surprising new entry to Olowu’s canon? Hoodies—seamed together from eye-popping combinations of floral crushed velvets and shimmering iridescent brocades.But as always, the devil was in the details; from the elegant drape of a skirt, to the gentle pointing-up of the shoulders on a form-fitting dress that balanced out the nipped-in waist. “It’s about using volume—not to cover things up, but to accentuate,” Olowu noted. His eye for color and print will always dazzle, but it’s still those thoughtful subtleties that shine brightest.
3 April 2024
Within the frenzy of London Fashion Week, Duro Olowu’s presentations are a breath of fresh air. Step inside his bijou studio in St. James’s, and Olowu’s understated approach to showing his collections is an object lesson in why some brands just don’t fit the standard runway format: If these clothes were whizzing past you to a blaring soundtrack, you’d never be able to appreciate them the way you can in this intimate environment. With all the conversation around the financial challenges of staging a full-blown runway show this week, let’s hope more young designers might feel emboldened to follow Olowu’s lead.It does help, though, that Olowu is one of the few designers as eloquent on the finer technical details of each look as he is waxing lyrical about dressing the women who surround him. “It encourages me to understand what I’m trying to do,” he said of the dialogue he opens up by inviting press and buyers to sit with him each season and talk through the looks as they come out, one by one. “Whether they love it or like it or dislike it, I believe in clothes that are potently emotional.”Seekers of potently emotional clothing need look no further than Olowu’s supremely elegant spring collection, which reiterates his mastery of clashing prints and colors. A pattern of quaint florals and diamonds lifted from antique drawer liners came both expanded and shrunk, while another print—graphic swirls inspired by the Surrealists—was painstakingly repainted in multiple colorways, spliced together to form a pleated skirt or decorating the sleeves of a loose-fitting shirt (and then paired with pants in a bracing shade of scarlet). “I didn’t want it to feel prissy or special,” Olowu said. “Although I always want the person wearing the clothes to feel special, of course.”It takes a certain kind of fearlessness to funnel all of this into a single collection, but an even rarer level of expertise to pull it off in good taste. Olowu’s riff on a classic, nipped-waist sundress was a standout, featuring a ruched bodice and tulip-like ruffles extending from the waist that doubled as pockets. “I think a dress without pockets is very outdated,” Olowu said with a smile. So it was with the deliberately scrappy floral arrangements that served as a backdrop to the look book, assembled by one of Olowu’s former assistants, Ragnhild Furuseth of Studio Lupine, and which he described as “meticulous but messy—and not at all stuck up.
”It’s that fascinating balance between the sophisticated execution of Olowu’s clothes—the just-so pleat of those trousers, the palpably luxurious silk rayons and cloques they’re cut from—and his bolder creative instincts that makes his vision so compelling. But it’s also the pleasure of listening to him talk that allows you to fully appreciate it. “The people who I admire and that I hope to design for are never people who make things, or believe in things—whether politically or creatively—because they want to be part of a club or part of a movement,” he said. “I don’t make collections to be prescriptive or didactic. I just hope, in some small way, they can help provide a new way of looking at and thinking about clothes.”
17 September 2023
With all the jazz-hands theatrics taking place across the London shows this season, it takes a lot to make a room of editors gasp. During the intimate salon-style presentations Duro Olowu was hosting at his cozy Mason’s Yard boutique on Monday, however, the designer prompted a collective intake of breath not with a surprise performance, but with—shock horror!—a gorgeous woman’s suit in a shimmering crushed velvet the color of a tequila sunrise.Watching Olowu’s clothes paraded around the room by a duo of models—surrounded by hand-printed fabrics on the walls with traditional West African craft motifs, and everything from Clarice Cliff ceramics to a pensive Lynette Yiadom-Boakye painting of a young man—everything just feltright, for lack of a better word.There’s the supreme confidence of his bold clashes of pattern, here arriving in the form of rhythmic block prints and a kind of blotted plaid that came in blue-yellow and brown-white, often placed directly side-by-side on dresses and knitted separates. Or the rich, kaleidoscopic florals that nodded to the ditzy post-war prints and tailoring worn by the steely working-class women in the films of Tony Richardson, including his transgressive 1961 masterpieceA Taste of Honey. Boldest of all was a razor-sharp knee-length coat and a ruffled cape in a glistening leopard print, the latter of which was styled atop a gorgeous bias-cut dress that combined the previously mentioned tangerine velvet with diagonal stripes.But it takes an even greater confidence to let the details speak for themselves, which is Olowu’s calling card as much as his lively prints. Skirts and pants hit the models’ calves just so, while a series of slip dresses featured serpentine panels that led the eye around the curves of the body, from one point to the other, like the continuous narrative device of an Old Master painting. Gentle peaks on the shoulder were created by delicate, invisible bundles of stuffed tulle, and every dress included pockets for practicality. “When you find something that’s nicely designed and comfortable, that’s when you know it’s a keeper,” added Olowu, also citing the pioneering work of photographer Al Vandenberg, and his eye for finding the tiny sartorial quirks within the rich tapestry of characters he encountered on the street, as something of an inspiration.
Rumor also has it that none other than Pharrell Williams stopped by Olowu’s studio this week, perhaps in search of inspiration for his debut collection as the creative director of Louis Vuitton menswear in June. Sure, Olowu’s vision is a world away from the hype-driven model Williams will likely sustain when he takes up Virgil Abloh’s mantle. But Olowu’s precise and pragmatic approach to dressing—along with his willingness to let his customers peacock a little, too—is something we can all learn from.
21 February 2023
Duro Olowu has always done things his own way. Far from the fracas of crowds gathering outside fashion shows all day across central London, the setting for his presentation was the hushed opulence of the Oliver Messel suite at the Dorchester Hotel. There, Olowu provided a live voiceover to accompany each look, all paraded by two models pulling gentle poses. With the rarefied air of a salon show from decades past, you’d be forgiven for momentarily thinking you’d stepped onto the set ofFunny Face.It helped that Olowu’s designs are the kind that can hold up to this kind of close-quarters scrutiny. There was enough to say about each piece to fill the full 20 minutes, and while the context may have felt old world, the clothes were thoroughly modern. As ever, Olowu relied not on mood boards or muses for inspiration, but instead combined disparate elements from the vast constellation of references that lives inside his head. Here, that encompassed everything from the bold color combinations of the late African-American artist Romare Bearden, the free jazz of Don Cherry, and lapels inspired by Little Richard’s flamboyant stage outfits. “I just like to surround myself with these various things and see where it takes me,” said Olowu. Once these starting points had been whizzed through Olowu’s blender, they emerged distinctly his.Where Olowu went in a slightly different direction was in his more muted palette, with a particular emphasis on ever-so-slightly gradated shades of black. Far from feeling heavy or funereal, his use of black tiered chiffon lent the dresses a refreshing breeziness, while his razor-sharp tailored trousers were effortlessly slick. “I think that if you treat black almost as a primary color, it sets things off in a certain way,” he said. “It's a very beautiful, very enriching color—normally used in a way to show that one is serious or severe, or one is mourning—but I hope that in the silhouettes and in the juxtapositions here, it becomes a lot more joyful and sharp.”The season’s standout print featured a graphic leaf pattern inspired by botanical drawings, toggled at different scales to create an intriguing aesthetic rhythm, and set against bold panels of stripes in shades of purple and lime green. Olowu’s eye for extravagant print, however, is always grounded by a sense of practicality.
The majority of his skirts were cut just so at the ankle, not only for the sense of movement it provided, but also for its innate ease of wear—the gowns managed to be both glamorous and resolutely unfussy.“What really inspired me this season was having this transitional wardrobe that wasn't just about winter,” said Olowu. “It's about lifting yourself up and feeling good in your clothes. I think more than ever, there's a need for strength in femininity.” If anyone knows how to turn that sentiment into desirable clothes, it’s Olowu.
21 February 2022
“I wanted to create prints that were full of aura,” said Duro Olowu, speaking from his studio in London. You need only take one glimpse at the riotous palette of his new collection to get the picture. This was Olowu at his most euphoric; a glorious acid trip of swirling print and color.But don’t be fooled. This wasn’t some thinly-veiled tribute to magic mushrooms, (though clearly, thefungitrend still has legs.) Instead, Olowu took inspiration from the art of British-Argentinian surrealist painter and photographer Eileen Agar, whose work was recently celebrated in an impressive retrospective at the Whitechapel Gallery in London. “Imagine what’s left behind after the waves come crashing in on shore,” said Olowu describing her idiosyncratic and otherworldly pieces. “Driftwood, plankton, seashells.”Regardless of origin, the ’70s-inflected brown and white motif looked terrific on his new cropped trouser silhouette; Olowu's pants shapes ran the gamut this season, from kick-flare to super-duper wide. The matching double-breasted peacoat is definitely worth a special mention, too.Easily the most mesmerizing print in the collection took cues from the legendary jazz composer Le Sony'r Ra, better known as Sun Ra. Olowu immersed himself in the world of the experimental musician via the acclaimed 1980 documentaryA Joyful Noiseby filmmaker Robert Mugge. Ra’s celestial vibes could be felt all over the neon-accented zig-zig prints that covered charming minidresses and camp shirts alike. Olowu is known for his impeccable taste and personal style, and the aforementioned shirts came finished with trimmings, including epaulets, that seemed to be culled from his own wardrobe. Olowu is one half of the art world's best-dressed couple: he and his wife and muse, Studio Museum director Thelma Golden, make an impressive pair. In many ways the collection illustrated just how playful and fun a cosmic feminine/masculine connection can look.
20 September 2021
Few designers can touch Duro Olowu when it comes to a knowledge of art history, but more than that, his painterly references always manage to speak to the moment. For fall, Olowu was looking at the work of Barkley L. Hendricks, whose portraits of Black Americans from the 1960s and ’70s captured the radical style of the era with an unparalleled sense of intimacy. As Olowu noted on Zoom in a preview of his collection yesterday, the artist would “give as much attention to the other elements in the room as he would to the subject.” In this way, the beautifully dressed men and women who inhabited Hendricks’s world stood out while also blending in. “They used style as a weapon to feel good about themselves and the future, but in a way that was still empathetic to their surroundings. It wasn’t about showing off,” said Olowu.As we emerge from this global crisis, ostentatious displays of fashion hardly feel in step with the times. And yet, to Olowu’s point, it would be just as foolhardy to dismiss the power of clothes to uplift and inspire. With his new collection, Olowu elegantly toes that line, making a case for dressing up that’s grounded in our new reality.Along with the omnipresent sweatsuit, sweater dressing has made a big impression in the last year, with designers leaning into the cozy possibilities of knitwear. Olowu incorporated several such all-enveloping styles, including an eye-catching belted housedress, though his most striking knits came with a tailored line, the neat black-and-white blazer that was paired with a sarong-style skirt in a matching graphic daisy motif being a good example. Even Olowu’s sharpest frock coats were cut with a reassuringly tactile hand; his matching high-waisted velvet pants are almost as forgiving as sweatpants, slightly tapered through the leg, with adjustable buttons on either side.Even still, there’s no denying the stand-alone power of a great dress—and Olowu understands that better than most. Finished with a smorgasbord of clashing prints, the new silk and rayon long-sleeve day dresses are Olowu at his best, hitting the sweet spot between exquisite and easy, with his ruffled spaghetti-strap number in an abstracted marble print ushering that idea into cocktail hour nicely too.Those ready to take optimism to the next level in their wardrobe will no doubt be totally charmed by the collection’s showstopper: a gorgeous A-line brocade dress threaded with silver and covered in an explosive floral print.
Accompanied by a matching jacket with billowing sleeves, the look literally turns the definition of a wallflower upside down.
24 February 2021
By now it’s abundantly clear that as far as fashion trends go, 2020 will be remembered for the sweatsuit. That said, the notion that comfort should be forever tied to athleisure is shortsighted. As Duro Olowu puts it quite simply, “Ease doesn’t have to mean track pants.”Today at his charming store in London’s Mason’s Yard, the designer presented his easy and elegant fashion antidote to these unprecedented times to a handful of editors and buyers. Olowu’s fashion acumen is rivaled only by his knowledge of art, and this season he drew on the work of Emma Amos, the acclaimed African American painter who died in May of this year. Known for her radical feminist agenda and challenging racial stereotypes, Amos understood that activism was part of her raison d’être as a creative. Her poetic use of color is front and center in the striking hand-painted striped prints that weave their way through the new collection. Olowu used them to particularly flattering effect on an elongated tunic over wide-leg pants, what you might call loungewear at its most chic.The designer has been experimenting with new skirt shapes, and the saronglike midi-length silhouettes felt especially in step with the moment. He touched on Amos’s use of collage with a stunning patchwork print on a sweet full-skirted dress that was fastened with a bow at the waist. Of the other 1950s-leaning looks in his lineup, the white dress that was embroidered with palm trees was especially fresh; a clear sign that there are reasons to get dressed again on the horizon.
19 September 2020
Duro Olowu is well known for dressing women in the art world. The muses he looks to for inspiration reflect the discerning tastes of his stylish clientele. This season he drew on the work of Françoise Gilot, who is perhaps most famous for being Picasso’s romantic partner, though the 97-year-old French painter, art critic, and author is a creative force in her own right. Olowu came across a recently reissued collection of her travel sketches, and her colorful impressions of India, Senegal, and Italy from the late ’70s and early ’80s informed his new collection. The soft pale blue and green tones of a belted cropped jacket and maxi skirt with gently ruffled hem were evocative of the faded yet glorious frescoes you find in Venice, a nice counterpoint to the rich, saturated palette that is Olowu’s signature. One particularly eye-catching coat in that series was spliced with panels of pale pink made from vintage interior fabric that Olowu came across on a trip to Lille, in northern France. It was upcycling done with a sophisticated hand.The designer has been working a more graphic line into his repertoire of expressive prints lately too, and this season there was an array of micro-stripe motifs collaged to flattering effect along trench coats and bias-cut silk satin dresses. In addition to Gilot’s sketches, Olowu was also looking at the photography of Beth Lesser, especially her fantastic images of the Jamaican scene of the 1980s. The wide-leg suiting in primary colors and slouchy pajama sets had an attitude and sense of ease that was straight out of the dancehall.Olowu is a master of mixed-media dressing, and for Spring there were several terrific examples to choose from, including a languid silk georgette frock tiered with several painterly floral layers. Beyond the familiar evening silhouettes, the new apron shape with double straps and pockets jutting out at the hip cut a striking figure. With its darkly romantic assemblage of brocades, the piece offered an arresting and modern portrait of a lady.
15 September 2019
Cosmopolitan, chic, andAfriquewere the three words that Duro Olowu used to describe the spirit of his Fall 2019 collection, which was inspired by Miriam Makeba, the fearless South African singer and civil rights activist. Makeba, who was known as Mama Africa to her fans, possessed a wardrobe that was purpose-built as a celebration of African pride at a time when her country was in the grip of apartheid. You could see her influence right off the bat, in a graphic knit coat with patch pockets and detachable snood (Makeba was rarely seen without a towering head wrap or hat). That motif was repeated to flattering effect on an A-line maxi dress that could have been pulled from her closet.Admittedly, Olowu is a fantastic composer of print in his own right. The leopard prints that he folded into the collection were a nice match to his signature florals. The vibrant colors of Stanley Whitney’s abstract paintings informed the irregular polka dot patterns that lent an eye-catching touch to a black double-breasted coat with fuzzy Mongolian fur sleeves. Olowu rarely wipes the palette clean, but when he does, the results can be just as dramatic as his marvelous prints. Case in point? A black taffeta high-waisted tuxedo skirt that was paired with a matching pussy-bow blouse with billowing sleeves. It was an elegant proposition for evening that is likely to seduce die-hard minimalists who might have been too afraid to try his vibrant aesthetic in the past.Still, it’s hard not to fall for Olowu’s mesmerizing print play, especially when it comes draped along a slinky bias-cut dress in painterly tulip brushstrokes. Naomi Campbell was clearly charmed. The supermodel was among the first attendees of his salon-style presentation in Mayfair this morning. The gorgeous 48-year-old model appeared especially fresh in a chevron jacquard look from the designer’s last collection. There were plenty more options for her to preorder today.
17 February 2019
Duro Olowu’s knowledge of art history can only be described as astonishing. And each season, some fabulous unsung female artist appears on his mood board. For Spring, he pulled from a broader sweep of references, however, starting with Jazz Age heroines through to more contemporary muses. “Dressing how you want to feel” was how the designer summed up the spirit of his new collection.Zora Neale Hurston through the lens of Carl Van Vechten, the famed Harlem Renaissance documentarian, was the first portrait of a lady that sprung to mind, at least in the silhouette. Long, languid dresses with a 1930s sway came collaged with Olowu’s signature prints—florals, polka dots, and a particularly charming butterfly print that covered a striking high-waisted pantsuit as well. There was an appealing airiness to the clothes. Indeed, even the most modest floor-length looks with full sleeves had an ease about them that belied their construction—the gorgeous blue floral number in the lineup is a good example, made with several layers of chiffon.Singer Corinne Bailey Rae was among the guests who attended Olowu’s presentation at an elegant townhouse in Mayfair. The two-time Grammy winner seemed to be making a mental wish list of looks including a dazzling silver dupioni silk blouse that came with a matching maxi skirt. “1930s gone Space Age,” as Rae put it. You could imagine her casually throwing on one of the many new neatly cropped jackets for cocktail hour, too. Designs like these would surely bring a breath of fresh air to the red carpet.
16 September 2018
Duro Olowu tends to populate his mood board with a host of strong, creative women. This season, Pauline Black—frontwoman of the two-tone ska revival band the Selecter—played the leading role in his inspiration. Fusing traditional ska rhythms with a punk edge, the music she made was a rousing response to Thatcherism in ’80s Britain and had a defiantly chic look to match. In politically volatile times such as these, that countercultural verve feels right. Olowu is a mix master when it comes to print and color, and he set the tone for Fall with a vibrant chevron pattern that was evocative of the colorful youth movement. It lent Olowu’s signature feminine dresses and blouses a graphic beat and was a nice foil to sharply tailored striped suiting.There was a second muse in the mix, namely Dada artist Hannah Höch. Like Black, Höch had no trouble holding her own in a male-dominated milieu. Her influence came through in the gently sculpted coats that were cut with geometric-print bell sleeves. The silhouette cut a strikingly sophisticated figure in the lineup and came in various eye-catching iterations, including a version in refined molten wool with a sleeve that was paneled with a patchwork of jacquard fabrics. Floral motifs are usually part of the scenery in Olowu’s world, and they gained a luxe bohemian hand on velvet robe coats trimmed with fluffy Mongolian fur. The neat floral miniskirt suit was new for Olowu, worn with optic white Chelsea boots, and the look was a nice complement to the designer’s long, fluid lines. It all managed to capture the rebel yell of youth with grown-up elegance.
18 February 2018
One of Duro Olowu’s many salutary qualities as a designer is his consistency: There’s no shape-shifting between collections, merely a patient, incremental, sometimes difficult-to-discern evolution of proportion, print, and line. What has been quite striking about Olowu’s last few outings, though, is the way the attitude of his clothes has toughened up. Still graceful, still very feminine, but stiffer in the spine somehow. With the redoubtable Lee Miller as his inspiration this season, that toughness emerged as a top note here, in a way it hasn’t before.Miller, of course, was a gorgeous and soigné model, photographer, and muse to Surrealist artists. She exhibited plenty of her own toughness when she documented the Blitz, the liberation of Paris, and the concentration camps at Buchenwald and Dachau during World War II before retreating to Farley Farm House in East Sussex to become a country lady and saloniste. For Olowu, capturing the je ne sais quoi of such a complex and lively woman entailed making clothes with a kind of frankness: be it a suit of ochre-toned denim, a shirtdress inspired by the trench coats Miller favored, a simple smock, or a lank, double-breasted coat. Even Olowu’s more worked looks had a certain matter-of-fact tone; to wit, his terrific mixed-print frocks neatly belted about the waist or a long shift with blouson sleeves. Much of the art here was in the detail; see Olowu’s top-notch wide-leg trousers, which featured a bit of pleating around the pockets that provided just a suggestion of frill.This being an Olowu collection, print was another standout element. His painted florals and geometric patterns went right up to the edge of being dissonant—one of the nods here to Miller’s passion for art, Surrealism in particular. The prints (and the ways they were mixed) were just off enough to challenge the eye, but still sufficiently inviting to draw you in. They had gumption. In that regard, Olowu managed the very neat trick of avoiding a literal Lee Miller homage, yet nonetheless conjuring her spirit exactly.
17 September 2017
In some ways, this felt like a very different Duro Olowu collection than his previous ones, at least those of relatively recent vintage. Although this outing was still tuned to Olowu’s distinctive key, there was a lot of newness here—new shapes, new proportions, a new sense of geometry. And though Olowu’s woman has never been a shrinking violet, what with her taste for vibrant color and mixed print, this season found her asserting herself even more forcefully. Her bearing here was one of almost regal authority.What jumped at you first about this collection was its graphic quality. Olowu’s key print was a check-like pattern almost strident in its black and yellow palette; the pattern was echoed elsewhere in the Prince of Wales check Olowu used in touches, a diamond-pattern jacquard, and a silk print that set florals over a black and white grid. Meanwhile, the graphic-ness was reinforced by this collection’s plethora of polka dots and stripes, the latter of which Olowu created via paneling.There was geometry, too, in the way Olowu blocked materials together in his outerwear and empire-waist evening looks. The dressiest of the dresses marked a real shift in Olowu’s approach to eveningwear; he went for maximal volume while maintaining a certain decorousness of shape, and doubled down on his instinct to have his woman take up space by adding big pouf sleeves to a handful of looks. The effect was very queenly. And if that’s what the queen wears out at night, her garb for day was just as commanding. Sharp-shouldered capes mixed with pinstripe silk/cotton tailoring and lightweight jackets and coats buttoned across the chest in a way vaguely redolent of a military dress uniform. The overarching message: I’m in charge here, boys. So watch out.
19 February 2017
There comes a time for choosing sides. As the Brexit dust settled around him,Duro Olowulooked around and contemplated the idea that politics can't merely be a matter of how you vote; your politics must be reflected in how you live, the company you keep, the art you make, the clothes you wear. There were no overt political themes in the collection that emerged from Olowu’s pondering ahead of this season, but they were smuggled in via his choice of muse: Nina Simone, exemplar par excellence of art made and life lived through politics, not to one side of it.You could make a case that Olowu’s oeuvre itself is political: His work expresses a firm belief in the mix, of the beauty that comes from fusing influences far and wide. An excellent tailor, he hews to classic Western fashion proportions and silhouettes, but uses them as the jumping-off point for combinations of color and pattern loosely suggestive of the gorgeous tumult of the multi-culti urban cityscape. This season, he raised the volume on that vibrancy, emphasizing bold graphics and a flashy palette, and threading in globe-trotting details such as kimono shapes, mandarin collars and raffia fringe. The lines of the clothes were elegant—Olowu will never sacrifice flattery of the female form in order to make a conceptual point—but the way they commingled disparate elements carried a strong, if subliminal, message nonetheless.This was an item-driven collection. Olowu paid particular attention to his trouser cuts, introducing new, cropped shapes, and he heightened the drama of his stock-in-trade dresses by sneaking in volume via hidden pleats. The evening looks were particularly resonant, done in precise yet relaxed shapes that exuded a nonchalant glamour. The assertive colors and patterns gave them a bird of paradise quality: The Olowu woman will be seen. And she will be heard too.
18 September 2016
Duro Olowuwas all about the bling this season. If you’re thinking diamonds and gangster chains now, however, please stop. Olowu’s gem fetish derived from the collaboration he recently embarked on with Madison Avenue jewelers Sidney Garber, in the course of which he became captivated by the luminescence of stones such as onyx, lapis, and jade. He picked up on those colors for the palette of his latest collection, and more broadly applied the idea of “preciousness” to his clothes. Olowu wanted, he explained at an appointment today, to make garments meant to be treasured as fine jewelry.But that was almost standard practice for Olowu. You'd be hard-pressed to date his looks—in this collection or previous ones—to any particular fashion season; in that way, they are like jewelry. They are meant to be held onto. This outing was a typically Olowu-esque exercise in, let’s call it, “restrained overstatement.” That doesn't seem like it should be a thing, but how else to describe the designer’s signature mash-up of bold colors, clashing prints, new and vintage materials, and the occasional operatic gesture, to wit this collection’s floor-length mosaic-print cape? Aside from that cape, the silhouettes here tended toward the decorous, with a slight preference for trousers and full skirts over the dresses that are Olowu’s stock-in-trade. The overall effect was brasher than usual, but that didn’t detract from the very adult sensibility of the clothes. Or, to put it in jewelry terms, this was bling of the most artful quality.
20 February 2016
Duro Olowuhas a talent for picking muses. His latest is the artist Amrita Sher-Gil, the “Frida Kahlo of India,” as Olowu described her, who managed to establish both an impressive body of work and an equally impressive reputation as a freethinking sexual experimenter before she died suddenly at the age of 28. Olowu’s silhouettes this season were a touch suggestive of those of India in the last days of the Raj—those late ’30s bias cuts, broad lapels, and built-up shoulders fit neatly into his idiom—but, mainly, it was Sher-Gil’s spirit that he drew on for his new collection. He conjured her via a mix of boldness and ultra-femininity.The boldness came through in the prints, the best of which was a dot-and-stripe on silk that Olowu confessed he’d doodled while on the telephone. (Never throw anything away, is the moral of that story.) There was also a painterly yet graphic wild orchid print, which Olowu executed with his typically canny sense of color.Olowu’s clothes always have a feminine flair—even his tailored pieces boast a certain voluptuousness. He doubled down on that here, showing lots of looks that featured flounces and ruffles. A long ruffle-hemmed camisole, worn with a matching likewise ruffled long skirt for a tiered effect, made for one of the collection’s standout looks. Another was a black dress open in the back and ruffled down each side; Olowu doesn’t usually mess around with neutrals, but this frock’s all-black color (or lack thereof) only showcased the grace of its cut. There was a similarly appealing sense of frankness to the cotton pieces in cobalt and khaki.As noted, Sher-Gil died young. Perhaps that accounts for the fact this collection seemed an unusually youthful one for Olowu. It was hard to put a finger on where that tone came from exactly—these clothes weren’t a far cry from those Olowu has created in the past. Maybe it was the extra skin on display, about the back and shoulders; maybe it was the way these pieces, even down to the gowns, exuded an air of thrown-on informality. Whatever it was, the youthful kick added to the appeal of Olowu’s familiar aesthetic, without diminishing its friendliness to women of all ages, styles, and shapes.
19 September 2015
Duro Olowu's latest collection took inspiration from the Fauvist painter Kees van Dongen, and something about the artist's work really got the designer's juices flowing. This was a larger collection than Olowu usually produces, and one more varied in its textures and silhouettes than recent outings. Alongside his signature capes and tailored mixed-print dresses, there were less familiar pieces, such as a flounced tank and full skirt of black lace and silk taffeta, a voluminous and very glam gown of pastel brocade, and formal shirtdresses in sliced organza or damask that featured dramatic draped backs. For day, meanwhile, he had a kimono jacket, split A-line skirt, and nipped-waist jacket made from grid-checked knit wool—a look that hinted at the line's emphasis on the graphic, another element that felt new. Bold stripes and color-blocks underlined the effect. It was nice to see Olowu expanding his idiom. But what kept this collection from feeling like a total departure—beyond the inclusion of much Olowu-trademark mixed print—was its reliance on disciplined tailoring. That's another signature and the thing that always makes his vibrant clothes look grown-up and sophisticated and not at all like a free-for-all. His fastidiousness about cut was evident, even when he worked with fuller shapes and with slack silhouettes like that of a lean, long silk shirtdress. If the Olowu clientele was getting a gentle push out on a limb here, it was also given a cushy safety net.
23 February 2015
As far as Duro Olowu is concerned, consistency is to be regarded as a virtue. As he commented at an appointment at his atelier today, his hope is that the women who buy from him stay loyal, and mix and match pieces among collections. And he honors that loyalty by maintaining a certain kind of proportion, a certain kind of attitude, a certain kind of silhouette. The way Olowu keeps this consistency from becoming boring is by being inclusive—he's a scavenger of references, and invites myriad of them into his signature confidently feminine, mixed-print aesthetic.This season those references included the cover art for the albumThe Pointer Sisters,Ozu's filmDrunken Angeland Japanese film noir in general, 1940s pinups, and the Senegalese island of Saint-Louis, where the collection's appliquéd starched brocade was made and which supplied Olowu with his Spring '15 palette. The '40s, meanwhile, gave a subtle new slant to Olowu's shapes—a soft peplum on a bias-cut dress, a strong shoulder to a jacket, an A-line skirt in Linton tweed—while Japan provided inspiration for vivid floral prints and pieces such as kimono-sleeve lightweight robe coats. Firm fans of Olowu will likely gravitate to this collection's graphic print of hand-drawn circles, which was emphasized throughout; new ones will come for drop-dead gorgeous, easily accessible looks like the emerald green bias-cut gown, with its waterfall of ruffles down the back. And once they're hooked, they'll return.
13 September 2014
Duro Olowu didn't exactly reinvent the wheel this season. But then, why mess with a perfectly good wheel? Olowu celebrates the tenth anniversary of his brand later this year, and the more seasoned he gets, the more he limits himself to fine-tuning adjustments to the look of his clothes. This season, the adjustment was inspired by 1920s-era furniture designer Elizabeth Eyre de Lanux and the Dada set—Man Ray, Schiap, etc.—who were some of her cohorts in Paris. There were a handful of vintage touches, like the prim organza collar on a silk print dress, and a handful of surreal ones, like the fur pockets on a coat. Silhouettes had a hint of Deco about them, and a recurring print—also executed as a jacquard knit—was directly inspired by the look of Eyre de Lanux's inlay woodwork. But these were all niceties; there was hardly a piece in this collection you wouldn't immediately identify as Olowu's, whether a tailored jacket with 3-D inverted seams in back, or the full skirt patchworked from fabrics ranging from vintage Bianchini brocade to an African artisan print harvested from Olowu's mother's house. After a decade of doing his thing, this designer is in no doubt as to what his thing is.
14 February 2014
Duro Olowu thinks big. But he can also think small. Olowu's latest collection found him exploring volume, with an emphasis on dramatic, variously patchworked or embellished cape coats and jackets. Much as you'd expect, these pieces had force. But the real charm of this collection was its easygoing spirit, and that derived from the less oracular looks—the ones that compelled you via subtle gestures. A case in point was Olowu's camisoles: As he explained, he set himself the task this season of making the perfect cami—one not too bare, or too short, or too long, that could be worn layered or on its own, and that had a bias-cut fit that just brushed the body. Well…job done. Elsewhere, Olowu scored with his double-hem print dresses, and with pieces in a seventies-style check, and with peasantlike cotton skirts and frocks detailed with contrasting Austrian lace. There was a kind of bohemian looseness here, minus any overt homage to the stereotypically "bohemian." Olowu is too deep a thinker for that; he knows what it is to be iconoclastic.
13 September 2013
One of the many compelling things about Duro Olowu is that he is a designer with relatively little interest in youth. He's not against the young, of course, but his collections express the conviction that they needn't have a monopoly on drama or fun. The clothes Olowu showed today were a case in point: A belted black coat with a fox collar was a sublimely grown-up look, and indeed an understated one for the designer, but its bell-shaped sleeves provided plenty of look-at-me oomph. Ditto the soigné full-skirt suit in Kelly green—the silk-blend tweed skirt had an emphatic silhouette, not fit for shrinking violets, while the trim jacket was elaborated by a humorously oversize, mottled fox fur lapel. Sophisticated? Yes. Boring? No.Parts of this collection found Olowu working in an atypically muted key. Alongside his signature bias-cut, patchwork pattern dresses, he showed a range of pieces that ought to have a broad appeal, such as sharply cut, wide-leg trousers in melton wool, graphic mohair sweaters, and slinky, bias-cut gowns that conjured an old-school Hollywood glamour. Elsewhere, though, his designs were unusually exuberant, nowhere more so than in operatic capes done in multicolored feathers or floral embroidered silk. The looks in metallicized dévoré velvet or silk split the difference, effectively. But overall, the message was clear—whether operating at full volume or in a quieter register, Olowu made the case that polished women are entitled to have just as much fun in their clothes as girls are.
15 February 2013
There's no rigorous way to test this, but it's entirely possible that Duro Olowu is the world's most charming man. It's not even necessary to spend time in his company to get the sense of his charm (although if you ever get the opportunity to hang out with Olowu, you should). His clothes exude the force and warmth of his personality. Seriously: There is no earthly reason why a trim jacket made with contrasting pieces of toile de Jouy should work, and especially not when it's got balloonlike pleated sleeves, and especially especially not when it's paired with a ruffled dévoré chiffon gown in a print that looks like the groaning innards of a volcano,but…Olowu makes the look convincing. Enticing, even. Taking in one of his ensembles is a bit like having the best conversation ever with a stranger you suspect may be mad. You just have to go with it.There were, of course, a number of looks in this collection that boasted an appeal that was easy to comprehend. An ensemble comprising a ruffled blouse and wide-leg pants in matching white silk noile was simply chic. After the recent explosion of digital print, Olowu's batiks reminded you of the tactile appeal of analog prints. Fine, graphic knits and slouchy big skirts just looked cool. And the bias-cut dresses, an Olowu signature, had an easy, graceful fit. Olowu himself defined something of the magic of his clothes today when he said that he avoids, at all costs, girliness, and designs instead for "a woman who stands her ground." It may well be that the heart of Olowu's charm, both personally and as a designer, is that he believes women are as interesting as he is.
9 September 2012
At first blush, Duro Olowu's high-impact designs seem to be made for a very specific woman—someone high-powered who gravitates toward feminine shapes and bold, even eye-searing patterns. And indeed, for that woman, Olowu's clothes are catnip. But give his collections time to work on you and a more universal appeal reveals itself. Take the short flapper-y dress in his latest collection: Made of hand-pieced strips of printed silks, it's got a punchy eloquence that is unmistakably Olowu's. Let your eye adjust, however, and it's also a flat-out pretty party dress; some nervy starlet should try it out on the red carpet.Olowu is well known for his mixed prints. But there's a method to his madness: His cuts are sharp, his silhouettes digestible, and the prints themselves are always combined in a disciplined way. This season, he achieved painterly results by going for more tonal print mixes, a strategy inspired by his obsession with the Egon Schiele paintingSelf Portrait in Peacock Waistcoat. The collection defaulted to shades of green and teal, with the palette girded by tones of brass, cream, and black, and spiked with hits of red and pink.All that could still make for sensory overload, if not for Olowu's judiciousness as a designer, as well as his warmth. The warmth is an overlooked but unifying aspect of his work: He can dofroideurperfectly well—witness his tailored black coat with daggered lapel, or the bias-cut black gown straight out of a Bette Davis picture from the thirties—but he'd rather be inviting. That coat, for instance, came in another, more memorable version, in color-blocked red and green striped tweed. It's a neat trick when a designer can simultaneously tamp down the formality of a garment and amp up its drama.
10 February 2012
"Allure." That was the result that Duro Olowu claimed he was seeking in a collection whose means to that end seductively embraced a varied spectrum of womanhood: from Renée Perle, the hauntingly beautiful muse of early twentieth-century photographer Jacques Henri Lartigue, to the Jamaican immigrants (Olowu's mother among them) who arrived in England in the fifties on a boat called theWindrush, to the London cousins the designer played with on childhood trips from Nigeria.Olowu molded these inspirations into a languid presentation whose subtle steaminess was ably assisted by another torrid New York night. But there was real spine to the languor. Olowu invoked the make-do ingenuity of theWindrushwomen, cobbling together a dress from fabric ends—lamés, laces, and florals—and throwing a man's evening jacket over the whole thing (but lining it with leopard for maximum effect). "Prim and proper in the Montego Bay style," the designer called it. "Practicality mixed with the need to look right." Except, in his case he was mixing vintage Leonard fabrics with his own graphic prints. And what a mix! Reference points to the contrary, there was a feel of YSL and seventies Ungaro in sinuous, jazzed-up dresses that flared, floated, or sported cascades of ruffles. That optimistic spirit was the essence of the collection. "Smiling through the hard times," Olowu said. "And freedom—for Lartigue's women, the freedom from corsets; for theWindrushwomen, the promise of a new life." If there was a political subtext there, it felt just right.
9 September 2011
"My clothes are about joy," Duro Olowu said during his presentation at Milk Studios Sunday night. It was a superfluous declaration, because the clothes had already spoken for him, especially as they were shown on a multicultural posse of models rounded up by the legendary Bethann Hardison. The exuberance of Olowu's clashing patterns overwhelmed the fact that nothing matched—or everything did, even when it was a long, Lurex-stranded cardigan belted over a block-printed gown. He was born in Nigeria, so it's a predictable misconception that Olowu's graphic sense has everything to do with Africa, but his Fall collection made it obvious that the designer's signature print (he called it his "market print") could equally be an Art Deco woodcut, or something from the school of Sonia Delaunay. And when he bias-cut that print into a languid tea dress, he perfectly captured the attitude of the striking beauties in James Van Der Zee's photographs of Harlem in the thirties.Van Der Zee was one of the collection's touchstones for Olowu. His others were the Mexican superstar María Félix, and the style of South American gauchos, which would explain the wide-legged culotte suit in a sugary tweed. Less influence-prone were a billowing tiered dress (OK, it did recall Kenzo at his best), or a coat collaged from strips of printed velvet. The designer described it as his "coat of many colors," which meant it was quintessential Olowu. As quintessential, in fact, as the appliquéd cape, or the jackets with the frilled shoulders. Utterly idiosyncratic, and kind of fantastic.
12 February 2011
With the constant what's-new-what's-now buzz of fashion—from designer duds to high street wares and every collaboration in between—having time and space to truly see something is a luxury. The small but bright and airy square of Duro Olowu's shop in Mason's Yard is a place to do just that.Fittingly, the muse for Olowu's Spring collection is a woman who tries to see things clearly and differently. "She doesn't buy clothes; she selects them," explained Olowu. His dream shopper would no doubt be intrigued by the witty spectacles print Olowu used throughout this collection, and she'd also be drawn to such considered details as the hand-sewn elastic waist on a silk shirtdress, the designer's sure hand with the bias cut, or the zigzag patchworking of prints.Olowu's Spring remix also incorporated the saturated colors of tribes in Papua New Guinea and the ever present influence of the designer's Nigerian and Jamaican heritage. Early fans of Olowu will be happy to see his vintage couture prints on voluminous-sleeved thirties gowns (hello, Harlow!) and a shirtdress that he topped with a raglan knit and called his new uniform. (He also showed how you could put a thin cardie over the airy silk of one of those glam gowns, pop on a flat sandal, and go about your day.)The designer flipped easily back and forth between retro silhouettes—a circle-skirted black suit was another—and a more pop, modern sensibility, as seen in a dress that paired his spectacles print with aBroadway Boogie Woogie-esque motif. Then again, Olowu also has a knack for bringing all his references into line—take the strong-shouldered and nipped-waist forties-style jacket intricately pieced together with lace from the historic mill Sophie Hallette and about ten different vintage prints. It was punky, elegant, throwback, and millennial all at once.
17 September 2010
Duro Olowu has a funny tale about how inspiration hit him for Fall: "I was walking around the gardens of Hidcote Manor, listening to dub on my iPod." Hidcote, for anyone who may not have a guide to British National Trust houses to hand, is an Arts & Crafts stately home in the Cotswolds with a gardenful of topiary, gazebos, and English flora. The dub part? Well, maybe it's traceable in this collection's slightly surreal color palette and take on English-lady eccentricity.In any case, no matter: The substantive shift here is in the tailored, geometrically patterned knitwear Olowu has added to his familiar repertoire of softly patchworked dresses. There's something of the seventies about it: A-line skirts; reversible shifts; supple, unlined, neatly fitted cardigan jackets; plus capes and slouchy coats. Elsewhere, the designer turned his attention to coating fabric, even to swing skirts made of heavy, lined camel melton wool. It will take a brave, tiny-hipped girl to carry those off with aplomb, but the rest of the collection is a typical Olowu potpourri of items that his collector-followers will happily adopt.
17 February 2010
Despite the fact that Duro Olowu had a lot of other things in that early collection, one lucky item effectively launched his career: the patchwork, multi-print, short, caftanlike Sally dress. Through being loved and worn and spoken about by theVogueeditor Sally Singer, it gained a reputation that spread across the fashion networks of two continents. Now the Portobello Road-based designer could be in the same position again. Though he has many other pieces in his Spring collection (inspired, he says, by the painterly palette of late Picasso), there was one dress editors were buzzing around as soon as they walked through the door. The new shape is more sophisticated but just as feminine as the last, constructed with a wrap belt, ripples of ruffles, and a soft collar that falls away into a hood. The genius is that it comes in short and long and looks like a completely different dress according to the fabrication—something like a modern tea dress in chiffon florals, and in plain purple crepe, more like an Ossie Clark/Biba/Halston-era nightclub number. The provisional name for this design, Olowu says, is the Harlem dress. But judging by the amount of editor interest it was attracting, it can only be a matter of time before someone wears it so much, she puts her name on it.
20 September 2009
Duro Olowu is never one to use two prints where three or four would do. For Fall, florals jostle with leopard, camouflage clashes with brocade, and metallics rub up against checks. "How do you wear color in winter?" he asks. "You've been into it all summer. Why give it up when it gets chilly?" For answers, he presented new takes on his signature blowy trapezes, but now cut as shirtdresses in rose-patterned patchworked panels, with a deep flounce. Frills also turned up running along the outside edge of sleeves—an original idea carried over from his last show. For evening, there's a thirties glamour to the contrast piecing, which appears cascading down the front of a chiffon column or puffed into short sleeves. Olowu says the collection has "an urban folkloric vibe in Technicolor," but despite the well-traveled eclecticism, the secret of his success is that these clothes are so easy to wear.
23 February 2009
In a London season that has been all about bright and brilliant color and print, Duro Olowu delivered a delightful visual overload of mixed patterns, luxe fabric, and tribal accessories. "It's about being able to dream. Wearable fantasy," he said, looking for words to describe his unique African-Parisian take on chic summer dressing. His visual sources were the classic 1959 filmBlack Orpheusand West African masquerade festivals he saw in Nigeria as a child, ideas he patchworked into little suits, jumpsuits, and dresses; accessories with Cocteau-esque glittery eye brooches; tasseled necklaces; and sandals he found in Beirut.What's interesting, though, is the way Olowu steers clear of any whiff of the hippie-boho: It's much classier than that. That's down partly to his use of vintage couture fabrics and partly to his knowledge of the way a certain slice of the cultural intelligentsia (including many Americans, like his gallerist wife) likes to dress. There's that—and his artistic way of seeing. Hard to think who else could get away with collaging lamé brocade next to black and white polka dots next to painterly flowers and checks—but in Olowu's hands, all that can go on in the space of one minute cropped gilet. That single hit of fabulous excess will function like a piece of jewelry to perk up any simple black dress.
17 September 2008
In three short seasons of showing on the London runway, Duro Olowu's command of a vibrant form of personal chic has grown to such a degree, you'd scarcely believe this is a designer who operates out of Portobello Road. His Fall collection was such a confident mix of multi-patterned couture, African batik print, and sophisticated styling that it evoked something of Yves Saint Laurent's gift for magicking wildly improbable color combinations into the epitome of easy-to-wear elegance. "Lush color and superluxury for winter," he called it, adding, "Really, it's about inner beauty and personal style." Olowu used vivid camouflage prints in several different colorways for tailored jackets and pants, chintzy roses for coats, and multicolored lamés on sloppy kimono coats; he also showed drop-waisted shifts and a newly sophisticated Empire-line interpretation of his signature patchwork dresses. There was a stately grace about his long, tiered peasant skirts, topped with either a crimson long-line cardigan or a taffeta riding jacket. It's a long way from that single breezy boho dress that launched his career, but in his focus on a grown-up customer who wants to stand apart in a sea of recessionary sobriety, Olowu offered an intelligent reading of the current mood.
11 February 2008
Duro Olowu has taken a sideways-on approach to becoming a presence at London fashion week. Building a business from his Portobello Road store, he first emerged as the designer of a single dress—an internationally recognized, flowy, patchworked print frock. Now, in his second season on the runway, he stepped up to the next level with an accomplished collection inspired, he said, by "the colors of the great jewels of the maharanis of India, the Baroda pearls, emeralds, and rubies."Not that it was a literal trip around the subcontinent. Olowu focused on a put-together look, opening with a jade-green, belted tailored pantsuit and a ruffled shirt in navy gingham, with a sparkling brooch at the neck—chic, down to the flat snakeskin sandals. He caught the London mood for color and breezy prints in an individual way with flowered dresses falling to the mid-calf and ending in ruffled hemlines. Simple shapes, maybe, but Olowu's uniqueness lies in his sure-handed way of sourcing precious old-school couture fabrics, and piecing them together in unexpected combinations. Thus, the familiar "Duro dress" has transitioned into a trapeze shape with tiered volume in front, cut from bolts of vintage couture silks, and detailed with patches of sequin. In all, it was a confirmation that this Nigerian-born designer has a clarity of vision that can build a brand—and an imaginative empathy that helps him design clothes women like to wear, come summer.
17 September 2007
Duro Olowu's show has finally brought the talent that's been cooking away in his Portobello Road store, OG2, into full sight. A Nigerian with a sophisticated eye for mixing splashily printed vintage couture fabrics with seventies-style tailoring and hoards of exceptional jewelry, he has steadily built a business—and many friends—around the first signature wide-sleeved, high-waisted patchwork dress he designed two years ago. Today's violet and bright-green African-print velvet coats instantly captured the essence of his appeal in their exuberantly luxurious swing."I wanted it to have practical volume," he said, "a regal normality. I called it 'Bamako Pompadour.'" Bamako is the capital of Mali, which, he explained, "had an empire of huge wealth and intellect—and beautiful women."If it was smart to lay a foundation for a couple of years before deciding to show, the move also raised the bar for Olowu, setting him the task of proving he can do more than just that one dress. He pulled that off by orchestrating a total look, from leather headband visors to necklaces made from recycled belt buckles and beads to shiny patent shoes and boots—all sourced from craftspeople he found around London. His new squared-offagbadadress, in fluid brown, black, and gray color-blocked jersey, had an easy, drapey elegance that looked fresh. And though a too long section of gamekeeper tailoring in the middle broke the spell a bit, that was only a minor beginner's demerit in a collection that brought a welcome shot of energy to London's shows.
11 February 2007