Jason Wu (Q3177)
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Jason Wu is a fashion house from FMD.
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | Jason Wu |
Jason Wu is a fashion house from FMD. |
Statements
2006
designer
2005
fashion designer
Remember COVID and the endless talk about change; change that, for the most part, never materialized. If the industry isn’t self-adjusting, that leaves it up to designers to write the script going forward. Jason Wu has accepted the challenge. “I just think the pendulum has to shift, and I can only start with myself,” he said on a preshow call. This season, Wu, like Alejandro Gómez Palomo, announced he is trying out a one-show-a-year model. Having made that decision, he wanted to do something especially memorable. So he secured the public square and gardens at Hudson Yards and worked with his friends Mary and David Martin and their nonprofit, MADWORKSHOP, to commission a sculpture,INK 01 / 6A 6B 6C,by Elise Co, a designer and technologist, in collaboration with artist Ben Borden, through which the models walked. Made of sheet steel, the hard, solid geometry of its structure contrasted with the fluid elements of the clothes.The idea for the sculpture grew out of Wu’s primary inspiration, the work of Chinese artist Tong Yang-Tze, who, at age 82, the show notes reported, “will be the first Asian artist to create works for the Metropolitan Museum of Art’s Great Hall commission this November.” Expect to hear much more from Tong. Based in Taipei, she creates large-size pieces using Chinese calligraphy. It’s not necessary to be able to read the characters to appreciate the airy, graphic, and gestural aspects of her work.When you put something down on paper, it has the potential to live forever. (We are still reading Shakespeare, for example.) Wu was taught calligraphy as a child, but his chosen medium is fabric. He did adapt some of Tong’s work as prints, but more important was the way the work inspired his own. The opening look was a coat that was screen-printed after it had been produced, which left some of the underfabric exposed. Nodding to painters’ canvas, the designer incorporated this material into his collection this season, where it shared space with silk, chiffon, and muslin. But it was ink, murky yet fluid, that really captured his imagination; he worked a lot with flou for spring, and lightness. This was reflected in his palette, a mix of pastels and black and white.
8 September 2024
Jason Wu is working his way through the four elements. Emerging from the watery depths of last season, he explored a dark forest—the setting for many a fairy tale—for fall. The aim, he said on a pre-show call, was to combine fantasy with “an element of darkness, something a little bit more sinister and interesting.” (Wu, like Sandy Olsson inGrease, is on a mission to revamp his image, and wants people to see him for who he is now, which is not the “polite and proper” person he was 15 years ago when he first became fashion’s darling.) It’s ironic that while the rest of the world is becoming obsessed with Capote’s swans, Wu is turning away from the ladylike finesse of his early work to lean into deconstruction. This is a technique he’s been playing with for several seasons now, and it likely connects back to the designer’s obsession with the work of Charles James, who, Wu said admiringly, made dresses as beautiful on the inside as they were on the outside. James, by the way, is credited with creating one of the first puffer jackets and Wu showed a washed one, as well as coats with snaps up the center back allowing them to breeze open with a beautiful gesture.Over the past year, Wu has continued to build on the tradition of American sportswear, showing an ever growing number of separates alongside the pretty dresses that he’s known for. This season’s opening look was a relaxed off-the-shoulder top and many-paneled skirt in gray jersey with a cobweb of exposed seams. A beautiful tulle embroidered top, light as an exhalation, was paired with black trousers, and tailored coats and jackets revealed their horsehair layers in a perfectly imperfect way. “There’s an idea of doing something that is super elevated, but at the same time something well worn,” Wu explained.Softness, and a kind of emotional warmth, was important here, too. Wu made use of draping and swaddling—the latter a trend that has carried over from Copenhgen to New York. Fortuny-style pleated dresses had bark- or lamellae-like textures that also related back to the brittle ink lines of the drawings of 19th century illustrator Arthur Rackham, whose work also inspired the custom print in the collection.The finale looks in the show owed something to James and, perhaps to Yohji Yamamoto, and were meant to convey a sense of undone-ness.
By exposing their construction, the designer also started a conversation about the art, and complexity, of making clothes as well as challenging the idea that beauty must be synonymous with perfection. Aren’t we all works in progress?Ever mindful of how difficult it can be to work in the industry, or even to sneak into a show these days, Wu invited 100 students to attend the show, including some studying with DooRi Chung, a former CFDA award winner, at Marist. “I really want to do something that’s not just only for me, because I believe in the talent that’s in New York,” said Wu. His collection provided another reason to do so.
11 February 2024
“I stopped doing four-themes-a-year years ago; that’s not sustainable. It’s one idea for four seasons for me, four chapters for one year.” So said Jason Wu on a walkthrough of his well-edited resort 2024 collection. The designer’s fascination with the sea, and with engraving-style prints, both of which appeared in his main line for spring, continued here. Hidden within a fig and flower motif was an octopus and pearl-bearing oysters. A group of these printed pieces were over-embroidered with sequins, yet finished with exposed seams, which sort of replicated the cross-hatch aesthetic of engravings while also keeping things unexpectedly casual.This kind of high/low play fits in with Wu’s feeling for treating utilitarian fabrics as precious and precious ones as utilitarian. What he described as a “couture” tweed turned up on a field coat. A beautifully tailored hourglass jacket featured yellow top-stitching like jeans often do. Continuing in the structured mode, Wu made a petal gown in homage to Charles James. “I’m really infatuated with the 1950s, I really love shape,” he said.Wu’s resort collection mixed elements of that era, with that of another, the sinuous 1930s. There was a narrow saffron-colored tube that would transform its wearer into a goddess, and slip dresses with seaweed-like frills. These also appeared down the side of full-legged pants and the edges of the square-shaped top it was paired with. Modern, elegant, and with freedom of movement, this ensemble was a beautiful example of the viability of evening separates. You might say it was in the swim.
3 November 2023
“It’s a very Euro moment,” noted Jason Wu, the man who notably dressed first lady Michelle Obama. The designer did his part to right that balance with a spring show that was based on the tenets of American sportswear. He also gave us another reason to love New York, by choosing as his location Isamu Noguchi’s Sunken Garden at 28 Liberty (formerly the Chase Manhattan Bank Building) in the Financial District, built between 1961 and 1964. It’s an interactive art piece in the sense that the viewer has to look down into the garden to see it at the street level; inside, where the show was held, it’s viewed through a round wall of glass. In any case it demands engagement, and Wu’s all for getting beyond the surfaces that are the lingua franca of fashion.This was a very personal collection, Wu noted during a preview, and one of his goals was to show that’s he’s a different person than he was when he was anointed a wunderkind in the 2010s. The rawness of the space was meant to match the rawness of the clothes, some of which were hand-distressed or had unfinished edges. This was a continuation of a theme introduced last season and now applied to spring. Let’s face it, Wu’s never going to be a punk—just as the concrete floors were softened by beautiful arrangements of wild grasses and wildflowers, so his pieces were pretty. Still, it was clear to see that the range was broader than usual; not only were there light-washed jeans and ethereal tanks done the Wu way, but separates options for evening as well, such as a raw-edged, bias-cut slip dress in various shades of sky shown over flowy, wide-cut jeans. Something as simple as styling dress-up clothes with flat platform sandals made them assume a different attitude, the ease often associated with American design.The TV seriesThe Last of Ushad Wu thinking about destruction and rebirth, hence the delicate fabric deconstructions. “I wanted to embrace imperfection,” he said. The prints of the season were inspired by ’30s scientific drawings and 19th-century etchings. Wu redrew a pattern based on the latter and included the face of Anna May Wong within its lines and swirls. There was a nice gravitas and hand-feel to this style, and it was a good contrast to the AI-generatedunderwater filmthe designer worked on in collaboration withMatthieu Grambert, an artist he found online. Hearing the call of the sea, the sinuous forms of octopuses were used as embroideries. There were mermaid hems and seaweedlike ruffles.
Wu is spellbound by the possibilities of prettiness. The layering looked new, if slightly in the direction of Dior Men. And the fluidity and movement of his pieces were both convincing and effective. Proof of which is that while lost and walking in circles postshow, all this viewer could think was that the small streets of FiDi were angled like the bias lines of Wu’s ethereal dresses.
10 September 2023
For fall Jason Wu leaned into his menswear training for a strong collection that combined hard and soft and had deconstructivist tendencies. For the pre-fall collection here, he’s made a case for an AM to PM Wu wardrobe. “I know a lot of people see me as more evening, but honestly, I sell the most day clothes,” the designer said on a walk-through.A clean-lined trench with a flower motif was so carefully placed that the pocket flap perfectly aligned with the placed print. Then there was the camisole top with an asymmetrical hem, a bit of drape, lace, and streamers paired with a sleek pair of pants that Wu described as a bit of “Calvin [Klein] mixed with an almost Victorian feeling.”This collection fits into the designer’s continuing exploration of American sportswear, with a focus on the ’90s. He’s sensing that the relative ease and modernity of that era vibes well with a time of belt-tightening and fashion stunt overload. At the same time, Wu is smart to tap into the post-war nostalgia that is also a force in fashion today. He described an ankle-bearing, off-the-shoulder LBD as delivering an “Audrey moment.” It’d be a nice option in which to, ahem, go lightly into a memorable evening.
18 May 2023
Designers and audiences are feeling for more intimate shows this fall. Jason Wu secured the bijoux Peter B. Lewis Theater at the Guggenheim as his location. “I wanted to change it up a little bit,” said Wu, who did so not only by moving his collection uptown, but through design as well. “I’ve been in the industry for a minute and I feel it’s important to push myself,” he said. “I think you know I love dresses, right? But tailoring is also something I love—I actually majored in menswear.”So it makes sense that Wu chose Marlene Dietrich as his muse this season. The German actress used fashion to play with gender at a time when such things were taboo, and the mix of masculine and feminine elements in her wardrobe inspired one of Wu’s strongest offerings to date. Change was evident from the first exit, a gray blazer/dress with a sculptural ruffle over one hip and an unfinished lapel in the deconstructionist mode the designer favored this season. It was a nice way to build upon the ’90s influence he introduced last spring.The collection also spoke to a growing weariness with the glossy and altered world of the internet. The German photographer Karl Blossfeldt’s un-retouched images of flora inspired a print in the collection. His way of “seeing things in such a perfect but imperfect way is something I think we’re all going back to,” said Wu. “We’ve been in this over-Photoshopped, over-filtered world; I think it’s nice that realness is coming back.” (Seeing some of that realness in terms of body diversity in the casting would have been a plus.)Wu said this was one of his moodiest collections, and the pairing of a fragile dress with a sturdy coat that might have been borrowed from a lover added an erotic element at the same time that it felt like a modern way to approach evening wear. Speaking of eroticism, the fringe on the dresses at the opening of the collection was actually bra straps with metal sliders; an ingenious and signature idea. It was also nice to see lingerie dresses that were revealing without being totally sheer for a change, as that’s how most women would actually wear them. The choice of bodysuits and briefs rather than strings for a look like the delicately beaded finale dress, with its gorgeous T-back detail, felt novel in this thong-happy world.The collection offered both flapper and hourglass silhouettes. In the latter category was a red blazer in toy-soldier red.
Also nicely fitted was what might be a perfect LBD, with a scoop neck and angled seams and an asymmetric skirt under which fringe fell ever so gently, like stamens from a flower.
12 February 2023
Jason Wu was on form for resort, with a collection full of updated references to the past. “I feel like what people want is something sexier right now,” said Wu on a walk-through, and he came at that goal from two directions, draping and retro glamour.Wu’s second skin and cut-out jersey dresses are both classic and of-the-moment. “A good Madame Grès never goes out of style,” says Wu, a designer who has a deep love of fashion history, as well as film. “The 1950s has been my source of inspiration since I was like 10, watching Hollywood movies. That’s how I learned English,” he said. The looks that most dramatically carried the silver screen’s allure forward were a strapless Yves Klein blue dress with a pouf, train, and the kind of silhouette Irving Penn might have photographed way back when. Sweeter and softer were tulle gowns, an airy one in lilac, and a sandy-colored one embellished with strips of gathered net that took 100 hours to make.Wu doesn’t only design for red-carpet outings, as a fuchsia shirt dress and shredded tweed bra and mini ensemble demonstrate. Cognizant that people don’t come to him for basics, he dressed up a blue skirt suit with a floral corsage, and offered a turtleneck in stretch lace.Resort hits stores during the festive season, and the most party-ready pieces in the collection were trimmed with a material Wu also used in his spring lineup: a tinsel woven with raffia, “so that it took the Christmas out of it.” Still, an LBD trimmed with the fun fringe would definitely fall under the category of a gift for oneself.
7 November 2022
When I first met Jason Wu, he was as into creating his glamorous line of fashion dolls as ready-to-wear. Fast-forward 15 years to today, when we’re living in a Barbie-obsessed world and there is more of a separation between the aesthetics of Wu’s two endeavors. “I’ve grown up a bit,” said the designer preshow. And he’s done so in the spotlight. Designers are public figures, but the intense attention Wu received after dressing Michelle Obama for two inaugural balls and other occasions (including the just-revealed portrait by Robert McCurdy) was career making.Wu said his customers, who come to him for feminine designs and what he describes as couture-like craftsmanship, have grown up with him. Soon to turn 40, the designer has finally arrived at a place of confidence. “When I was starting out, I was always a bit insecure, because at that time, the other young designers were way, way edgier than me, and I just don’t have an edgy bone in my body,” he said with a smile. He willingly admits that he is not a minimalist either, though his spring collection is probably as close as he’s ever gotten.Like many people, Wu, who is based in the Garment District, has been thinking about American design. Recently he’s been focusing on the strides made by designers like Calvin Klein and Donna Karan in the late ’80s and ’90s. The goddess-y ruched dresses, the wispy slip dresses and easy separates—like a sparkling mesh tank worn with satin shorts—nodded to their legacies.This was a collection infused with light and softness. The opening tailored looks included semisheer inserts and dresses and pants wrapped around the body. Streamers floated from the straps of neat sheaths, and spaghetti straps and other lingerie details were used throughout. Disrupting the delicacy of the collection, in a good way, were bondage-like florals designed by artist Leonardo Pucci, whom Wu discovered on Instagram. Raffia tinsel dresses added texture and volume that was fresher than the pretty tiered princess frocks that the designer can by now probably design in his sleep.There were a number of asymmetrically side-draped yet trim dresses in the collection, and it was these that seemed the most signature Wu. They recalled the elegance of the Italian illustrator René Gruau, who was friends with, and drew the work of, the designers who created the golden age of couture, an era Wu, who himself draws, has always been interested in.
“Before I wanted to color inside the lines, but now I’m happy to color outside of them,” said Wu, and he did so by using soft fabrics and letting the silhouette follow the body rather than creating it with strict boning. The result was clothing that imparts ease in the physical sense and delivers the kind of relaxed glamour that feels real and right for how women live today.
10 September 2022
Jason Wu has been watching sales climb since earlier this spring. Rising cases notwithstanding, collectively we seem to have decided that it’s time to go out again—and to dress up. “People are going the extra mile,” he observed of the parties he’s been attending. You could say that Wu is going the extra mile, too.Dressing up is what he specializes in, but after two years of Covid, Wu’s approach has changed. Cocktail dresses and gowns still populate his collection, only now he favors washed satins and recycled polyester taffetas over more traditional materials. He likes the former for its texture and attitude—“it’s less stuffy and has more life,” he explained. The latter he uses for its modern, even tech-y feel. Both fabrics lend notes of ease to silhouettes that are otherwise quite precious. Wu hasn’t lost his flair for embellishment—see the petal-like sleeves and bustline of gowns or the couture-ish peplums on going-out tops—but the fabrics are well-chosen for the current moment. Another way his party dresses are distinctive: the warp printing method he used, in which individual threads were printed, not rolls of fabric. The technique added depth and interest to his lush watercolor florals.
10 May 2022
“We did the best business in our company’s entire history last year,” Jason Wu shared backstage. Considering 2021 was bookended by Delta and Omicron, those results seem unexpected, even counterintuitive. His specialty is fancy occasion dresses: Who needs one of those in a pandemic? It has been a sobering time. “Women just want to look beautiful,” Wu rationalized.For fall he looked at fashion illustrations of the 1950s. As a young person, he considered pursuing illustrating as a career; then and now, the stylized, expressive lines of the era’s advertisements and editorials resonated for him. “There was something really beautiful about them,” he said. “So that will be reflected in the collection—that human touch.”Last season Wu used words likeindividualandintimate; here he was talking about imperfection. There was nothing that approached what we think of as deconstruction—he’s not that kind of designer—but the collection felt rawer at times than his typical output. Tweeds unraveled into thick fringes and warp printing resulted in blurry, imprecise florals. All the satins were thrown in the washing machine for a less precious look.The expressive volumes of 1950s haute couture have been in the air since Demna’s Balenciaga couture debut last July. Wu made them his own by recasting them in modern shapes, like a puffer coat cut in waterproof moiré with an era-appropriate midi-length circle skirt, and a bow-front cocktail dress split into a separate top and skirt for versatility. Slim cigarette trousers paired with a satin bustier provided a body-conscious counterpoint. But the stars of the show were the strapless moiré party dresses, one in marigold and the other black; they delivered on the glamour of those ’50s illustrations.
12 February 2022
Diane Kruger gave Jason Wu’s resort collection its debut when she wore his voluminous off-the-shoulder dress in shocking pink taffeta to the American Ballet Theatre gala last month. Though Wu showed the new clothes to stores back in June, he’s releasing images now. He’s a firm believer in keeping these in-between seasons under wraps until they hit stores. His thinking is: When desire strikes, his clients should be able to act on it, not wait months and miss an opportunity to buy. Meanwhile, Kruger gets to wear a dress that looks custom-made to red carpet watchers, which adds intrigue, stoking desire. Everybody wins.Wu’s resort is a prelude to the spring collection he showed on the runway at New York Fashion Week in September. “It was really the first collection of 2022,” he said during a preview, and “I was thinking sexier, just, you know, as a reaction to a year of not-so-sexy dressing.” Not everything here is headed to the red carpet, but it’s not office fare either. The colors are vivid; the flower prints are lively, not subtle; and the mood is up. While the volumes of Kruger’s papery taffeta gown are particularly exuberant, he did slinky too, in the form of satin slip dresses with lingerie seaming and cutouts or placement prints. Another flower-print dress barely scraped the thighs. “I actually haven’t done short in a while—I would say years,” said Wu. It suits him, and it’s on trend.
11 November 2021
Finding perfection in imperfection is not how anyone would’ve described Jason Wu’s vibe in the Before Times, but a pandemic changes things. “COVID makes you work differently,” he said at his show today. “It felt like we were back in start up mode again, getting our hands dirty.” That idea has become something of a refrain this week; if there’s a fashion upside to the last 18 months, it’s that they’ve reconnected some designers with process: with the act of making clothes, not the pursuit, say, of Instagram likes.Wu is one of those designers. He hooked up with Cara Marie Piazza, a fabric artist who uses natural dyes, to develop prints, sometimes applying color with a sponge and other times using the fabric bundling technique. It was new to me, so I looked it up. In essence: You place real flowers on a piece of fabric, roll it up, and the flowers imprint themselves on the material. The effects are blurry and imprecise, made all the more so by the soft, washed fabrics he chose. Wu described them as impressionistic.This signature collection is still devoted to dressy, special occasion fare, rather than sportswear, but the sensibility has evolved since it was last on the runway circa February 2020. The hand-rendered details and the “individual and intimate” results feel attuned to the ways that shoppers have changed during the pandemic, too. Formal, but still relaxed isn’t an easy combination to achieve, and it’s new for Wu, but he did it here.As for the lush Emma Thompson-designed flower installations on his runway? Much of it will go to Pratt, where Wu will give workshops on natural dyeing techniques for students. “It’s a full circle,” Wu said. That sounds right. Nice developments, all around.
10 September 2021
Jason Wu Collection is headed back to the runway in September. For two seasons, Wu has presented his lower-priced line at New York Fashion Week, releasing photos of this signature label on a see-now, buy-now time frame. “There was no fantasy last year, there was a whole lot of reality,” he explained on a Zoom call. “People were very conservative.” Since March though, Wu’s Collection sales have turned around, and he’s feeling recharged and newly optimistic. “It’s going to be a great moment for the city. It’s about all of us being united again after going separate ways.”The long spell off the runway has refocused Wu’s work. He’s less interested in feathers and frills for obvious reasons—there’s been fewer occasions for them. These days, he’s redirecting his decorative impulses into prints, and he’s also developed a penchant for collaboration. His fall prints marry the work of two women, the Japanese artist Ozabu, whose preferred medium is pencil, and Wu’s longtime florist Emily Thompson, who has an inspired eye for color.“I’ve been craving new ideas and a sense of interaction,” Wu said. “We were alone last year, but that didn’t mean we had to be insular.” Collages of Ozabu’s and Thompson’s work decorate such wardrobing staples as trenches, shirtdresses, and cashmere sweaters. The results look special without requiring a special occasion in which to wear them. It’s a timely adjustment, with women reexamining the value of big-ticket items.That said, Wu did let himself fantasize a bit. There’s a long dress in strapless tulle finished with a frothy, abstract flower and two more in taffeta with dramatic volumes at the bodice. He tempered them somewhat with raw, unfinished edges, but there’s no mistaking them—they’re honest-to-goodness gowns, which will demand a red carpet or a gala. Or maybe not? Wu reported seeing a woman eating dinner in one of New York’s countless outdoor dining set-ups in a strapless red dress. “I want glamour,” he said. Him and her both.
2 June 2021
Today, with spring 2021 collections beginning to arrive in stores—this Jason Wu collection included—the designer is finally releasing his look book. The portfolio, shot by Ethan James Green, stars the model Dilone, who, it was reported, is playing Pat Cleveland in Ryan Murphy’sHalstonminiseries for Netflix. Dilone strikes some very Pat Cleveland poses here. That’s a telling bit of synergy.It’s been nearly a year since Wu put his main collection on the runway, or shown it at all. This signature line had become a showcase for his dressmaker skills, and with special occasions off the table amid the pandemic—not even A-listers have much call for crystal-strewn tulle these days—it required a rethink. And while there’s no line-for-line comparison, these clothes do have some of the unstructured freedom that Halston was famous for in his late-1970s heyday.“Women still want to look beautiful and feel sensual,” Wu said via Zoom, “but there’s a new relaxed attitude.” He conjured it via a slip dress, a sweatshirt and skirt combo, and one very pretty cami and skirt set that he said riffs on a vintage kimono he bought at a Brooklyn shop before the pandemic set in. All of these pieces feature flowers that are the work of Noriko Takeshita, a Kyoto-based artist who Wu discovered via Instagram.Engineering the flower prints to align across the hem of that sweatshirt and the waistband of that skirt, and on many of the other pieces here, was made more difficult by the fact that Wu and his collaborators were working remotely. “I’m proud of being able to do all this without going to Italy; 2020 was like being in startup mode again, like going back to basics. It was humbling.” But rejuvenating too. Wu shrugged off much of the formality of his recent work, and the results are more engaging for it.
28 January 2021
Rebel Wilsonwas on the Oscars red carpet today wearing a gown by Jason Wu as the designer’s show was getting underway here in New York. Wu is focused on special occasion clothes in his signature collection, but Wilson’s gold and silver sequins vibrated at a higher frequency than the dresses he put on his fall runway tonight. He said that the work of Egon Schiele and exotic orchids inspired him this season. The silhouettes were alternately willowy and frothy and the palette vibrant in shades of violet, teal, turquoise, and fuchsia.The artistJessica May Underwoodpainted orchids in watercolor that Wu reproduced on a white silk jacquard tie-neck blouse and skirt. It was a subtle print. The whole collection was quite understated, notwithstanding the 100,000 Swarovski crystals that decorated a tulle slip of a dress, and the scads of feathers embellishing another party frock. It’s not that Wu has scaled back his ambitions—the workmanship in the metal-thread silk organza petals of a sleeveless number put paid to that notion. It’s just that after nearly a decade and a half in business he knows himself. Wu is very good at the surface level of the fabric, see those organza petals especially. Here, he did another interesting thing that looked like quilting, but remained unlined and quite light—light enough to be cut into a trim blazer and pencil skirt. Minimal-leaning romantics will be charmed.
10 February 2020
Jason Wu was on the runway tonight after a year-and-a-half absence. There are risks involved in removing yourself from the conversation. Fashion moves fast and a new New York generation is staking its claim to audiences’ shrinking attention spans. But this self-imposed break—taken, Wu said, because he was tired and wanted to spend more time in his atelier—appears to be all upside. He got to have an August vacation in Italy and Majorca, and he delivered a concise collection of evening looks that combined his signature precision with an appealing, rumpled—yes, rumpled—ease.Backstage Wu explained that most of the fabrics he used had been washed. The process cut the preciousness of silk habotai and other fine materials. In the silk habotai’s case, it gave a slim sheath a crinkly quality, where washing the satine of a strapless hourglass in a pretty withered floral print by photographer Maxime Poiblanc produced more three-dimensionality. Even still, the silhouette here was romantic and willowy, close to the body with flashes of upper thigh. Suits played a secondary role, but they were likewise cut quite lean. Wu paired them with matching bra tops in the au courant style.The confident focus of the lineup was its strength. Specializing in something precise seems like the right thing to do in this moment of a rising consciousness about fashion’s profligate waste. Wu definitely has an exacting approach, the intentional imperfections of this collection aside. One thing, though: In his absence, fashion has become a more inclusive place. He dresses women of many sizes on the red carpet. Why not reflect a more diverse beauty on his own runway?
8 September 2019
Jason Wu has a new fragrance, his second, so he’s rented out a Mercer Street storefront for a month to promote it. Behind the shop’s back wall is an enormous artist’s loft, and it was there that he installed his Fall Jason Wu collection on model forms. Unsurprisingly, there were synergies beyond the location between his new scent and his new clothes. Velvet Rouge is “rose-centric,” and his meticulously constructed cocktail and evening dresses (the daywear is back in the showroom) take their cues from the flower’s overlapping petals.The strapless neckline of the red dress that stands at the entrance was aflutter with hand-cut and frayed ruffles. Nearby, a black-on-white flocked velvet gown boasted vertical bias chiffon “drips.” He likened a third dress to a “deconstructed Madame Grès” because its pleats were idiosyncratic where hers were idealized. Wu’s meticulousness means that the dresses’ intentional imperfections were rendered perfectly. He said he stepped away from the runway last season to spend more time in the studio. Presumably, he also did so to cut costs. Either way, it seems to be paying off. The 18 dresses held together as a series: hyperfeminine, delicate, and minimal in spirit, despite the workmanship. Only an ’80s-ish party dress with a deflated taffeta bow at one hip looked like an outlier.In a walk-through, Wu was asked about the Oscars, three Sundays from now in Los Angeles. Because of resources, he explained that he works with just one celebrity per awards show. He flew out to L.A. twice to fit Mandy Moore’s off-the-shoulder number for the SAG Awards last month. “It’s not about quantity; it’s about quality,” he said. Is there a better maxim for this time?
11 February 2019
Jason Wu has joined the growing ranks of designers presenting their collections off the runway. At his presentation last Friday afternoon he said, “I felt very tired. I was always doing something all the time. I didn’t get the chance to work in the atelier, and I needed that.” There was a refreshing honesty to Wu’s admission, and it was reflected in the concise array of dresses he presented—all dresses, he added, because “it’s about my obsession.”When Wu got into this business a dozen years ago, dresses were his métier—he had been a designer of dolls’ clothes—but then he took on Boss, the German brand known for suiting, and his repertoire at his eponymous label grew, too. Wu’s exacting sensibility lent itself well to tailoring, and the pinstripe dresses trimmed in black lace he designed for Spring were a reminder of that. Other dresses patchworked from an assortment of laces he’s used over the years exhibited a similar disciplined rigor despite their asymmetry. Current fashion feels decidedly undone; a lot of frocks out there look like bad Butterick patterns by novice sewers. Wu offers the antidote to all that, be it in the form of a bonded crepe sheath in navy and blood orange with a ruffle at the neckline or a strapless gown of tiered black tulle.The crystal-encrusted naked numbers felt a bit out of place amid the other dresses. At least it was easier to envision where the pastel tulle gowns and multicolored lace were headed: the red carpet. Most appealing of all was a romantic sleeveless style that Wu said he tea-dyed to a mottled white and pink. That looked like time in the atelier well spent.
12 September 2018
With many of his designer contemporaries showing in Paris, Jason Wu had an opportunity to make a big impression this season. Ahead of his show he said he called upon the Italian architects and industrial designers Ettore Sottsass and Michele De Lucchi for ideas, and that he was particularly turned on by their work as jewelry makers. Swarovksi crystals were stitched to skirts, sweaters, and dresses, and dangled from the twine belts wrapped around the waists of tailored jackets. Wu has always liked a bit of strass, but these crystals had new qualities—they were artful and quirky. The effect came across best on sleeveless evening sheaths. His other decorative impulse seemed more inspired by Mariano Fortuny, the Spanish couturier who developed a proprietary technique for pleating silk in the early part of the 20th century. Wu experimented with a midriff cut-out to make the plissé look modern, but the results were overcomplicated. In general, midriffs have started to feel overexposed anyway.To complement the mini jewels, Wu used a lot of vibrant jewel colors. He made the case for ruby-color trousers for work, pairing them with a pale blue men’s shirt—it was one of the few things he had to say about daywear. His evening propositions included an emerald slip dress, an emerald long-silk-coat-and-pajama-pants ensemble, and more of those Fortuny pleats in shades of sapphire and aquamarine. Despite all the color, this was a muted outing for Wu, short on new things to say. Nothing ventured, nothing gained.
9 February 2018
Jason Wu’s contemporaries are upping and leaving New York Fashion Week, but he’s innovating on his own terms. Having opted out of a Resort presentation in June, he combined his pre-collection with his Spring offering. “This is the first time in a long time I didn’t feel like I was playing catch-up,” he said before the show. That’s a positive development.His other news for Spring: “It’s going to be easier than what you’ve seen from me,” he said. “It’s getting more casual.” That doesn’t mean that we saw sports socks—and thank goodness. We’ve had our fill of those, haven’t we? But within Wu’s polished vocabulary, this show did register as more loosened up, thanks to details like a midriff-baring cutout on a striped cotton dress and laces suspended from a crinkled silk coat.The use of jersey was new, and it gave the evening pieces in that fabric an athletic mien. Wu claimed Madame Grès, the early-20th-century designer remembered for her groundbreaking pleating techniques, as an influence. That instinct was a promising one. Despite all of their intricate handwork, Grès’s dresses look modern more than three-quarters of a century later. Some of Wu’s versions—pleated and patchwork prints sprinkled with large rhinestones—erred overcomplicated. The sheer gowns, pleated from the hips down, didn’t flatter, either. In comparison, his tailored blazers had a straightforward, effortless appeal. We also liked the simplicity of his trim peplum sweaters and slinky jersey skirts.
8 September 2017
Jason Wu’s Pre-Fall lineup touches on several of the trends that define the season. Like most designers, Wu presented this pre-collection back in January, before Fall hit the runway, but he’s only releasing images now that the clothes have arrived in stores, the thinking being that the element of surprise will seduce his customers. Wu’s got stripes in the form of pinstriped tailoring, he’s got pleating on plissé lamé evening separates à la Fortuny, and he’s got Fall flowers decorating midi- and floor-length dresses. But the idea that really dominates the new collection is asymmetry.With few exceptions, his hems are handkerchief, necklines are graphic and irregular, and piped seams twist around the torso and hips of dresses. The overall effect is one of relaxed languidness. These are dressy clothes in keeping with what Wu usually does, but they have an appealing informality. Even the pinstriped suiting seems to have a softness. “What’s important today is the sense of ease that women are looking for,” Wu said. “Clothes have to be multi-seasonal and multi-occasional; no one’s changing several times a day.” Wu relied on corsetry lacing and small silver grommets to give individual pieces an edge; a strappy-shouldered black number with laces gripping the midriff looks sexier than his typical fare while retaining a certain chill spirit.
28 April 2017
Jason Wu is celebrating his 10th anniversary in business this year. He was just out of Parsons when he put on his first show at Bryant Park, and he’s been in the spotlight from the start. Fashion was instantly charmed by the young maker of dolls’ clothes who had turned his mind to party frocks. Then the Michelle Obama moment came—she wore his white chiffon one-shoulder gown to her husband’s first Inauguration Ball in 2009—and Wu was a household name at 26. Still just a baby.He’s hardly what you’d call “aged” today at 34, but Wu has done a fair bit of growing up in the years since, a fact he was quick to admit this week in his studio. “There was a real naïveté to my early collections,” he said. And a sense of fantasy. Which is why he’s worked to incorporate more tailoring into his lineups. There comes a point, he said, “when you want to dress her for all occasions.”His Fall show started out on a particularly casual note, with a short-sleeved popover top and skinny cotton pants embroidered in a tonal dot pattern, a nod to the July-August timing of this collection’s arrival in stores. From there Wu touched on many of the elements of the modern fashionable wardrobe. He had sweater dressing in the form of a velvety black chenille dress. He had head-to-toe-print on a pair of whimsical florals with line drawings of nudes tucked among the blooms. And he had the suit that isn’t a suit—see the blue plaid sleeveless shell and matching midi skirt. Also: a cool black sweater with crescent moon slices cut out of the shoulders that were worn with cigarette pants.No surprise given his early party dress fixation, Wu lavished a lot of attention on evening wear. An absinthe and black devore velvet draped and wrapped cocktail number looked like an early contender for dress of the week. Yep, all grown up.
10 February 2017
Having seenJason Wu’selectricSpring show, the Resort photos he’s releasing today in advance of the clothes’ arrival in stores look like a test run in a lower key. That’s not a negative. Wu’s neon-tinted Spring collection was true to the flirtatious, whimsical aesthetic of his early years while retaining the streamlined modernism of more recent seasons; it was the Wu at his best. Resort, too, finds Wu in fine form, splicing floral prints together on slip and T-shirt dresses, and doing the same with mismatched black lace on evening numbers. These dresses are complicated feats of construction—pity the poor patternmakers!—but they come off fluidly and they look like they’d be a nearly weightless, effortless pleasure to wear.Wu played against type with a pair of oversize loden green pants that pooled at the model’s feet; his customers will more likely gravitate toward a neatly tailored coat and the razor-sharp, ankle-grazing trousers he paired with it. Elsewhere, his ribbed knit separates and clingy knit slip dress with asymmetric hem were a smart balance of strict and sensual.
27 October 2016
New York designers are rethinkingFashion Weekin large and small ways this season. On the macro level are the brands that have switched to an in-season selling model. In comparison, Jason Wu made more of a micro change. He cut his guest list to just 250 people and swapped the sweeping views of his former shows for a more intimate salon-style presentation in Spring Place, Spring Studios’s private club, which was lined with mid-century furniture and dramatic flower vitrines by Putnam & Putnam. The new venue befit the shift in tone. In recent seasons, Wu has favored a subdued palette and a restrained sophistication, insisting he’s grown up alongside his clients. This appealing collection was downright exuberant in comparison—awash in neon colors, high shine, foil-like materials, and many, many flowers, which the audience took in at close range.Wu said the work of Ugo Rondinone was his starting point for Spring. Rondinone is the artist behindSeven Magic Mountains, a large-scale installation of seven 30-foot-tall stacks of brightly painted boulders in the desert outside Las Vegas that reads as a comment on humans’ impact on nature. He’s also the guy who installed an enthusiastic, rainbow-stripedHell, Yessculpture on the façade of the New Museum when it opened on the Bowery back in 2007. The sunny optimism of both of those works played out in the collection’s best pieces: tulle dresses with three-dimensional embroideries of fluorescent flowers, which will be a kick to wear. Mood elevating seemed to be Wu’s intention here, whether we’re talking about a wispy, sleeveless lace dress in highlighter yellow, or athletic, compact knit dresses that flashed hints of midriff and wide-expanses of shoulder.An accordion-pleated dress in a foil-like metallic blue strove for a similar effect but the results were a bit bulky. Other looks in a sheer material with metallic threads zigzagging across the midriff and neon trim felt overworked. All in all, though, this was Wu in fine fettle.
9 September 2016
Before his show today,Jason Wushied away from discussing specific inspirations. “I was really thinking about an idea of a wardrobe,” he said, “the way our customer wears our clothes, what I think luxury should be.”As discreet as that sounds, Wu did a fair bit of upending expectations in his new Fall collection. It started right with the first look, a checked suit the skirt of which grazed the bare mid-thighs above velvet court-shoe stilettos. (Prepare to see a lot of high heels this season.) Feathers for day were another surprise. Back when he was known for frothy party dresses, Wu lived for a plume. After seasons of not touching them, they came breezing into the picture here on a narrow skirt, a gray flannel dress, even on oversized, rather mannish topcoats. Also unexpected: the collection’s many strappy backless pieces. Wu relied a bit too much on this silhouette; it’s hard to imagine even a devoted customer needing more than one exposed-back ribbed knit dress, short-sleeved jacket, or tunic in her closet, but their flirtatious spirit was appealing.Wu’s experiments produced one of his more diverse lineups. Minis mixed with midis. Windowpane plaids shared the runway with a floral jacquard and a lush rose and poppy print. Athletically minded ribbed knit dresses got some play, but so did delicate lace slip dresses. There was a single standout brown leather coat accessorized with one of the many detachable fur collars that came down the runway. As a collection, its lack of cohesion worked against it, but individually there were sellable ideas.
12 February 2016
The temperatures are hovering near freezing for the first time this season here in New York, and the department stores are filling up with sandals from theSpring ’16 collections. There’s something wrong with the system as it stands. We can complain all we want about it (and trust us, we do), but until we start making changes it’s just empty words. That’sJason Wu’s thinking, at least. Resort, which arrives in stores in November, found him working with heavier-than-usual fabrics. Pre-Fall, which ships in May, is the reverse.Save for one knockout silver and golden fox coat, the collection was long on fluttery slip dresses and shirtdresses with low-key corsetry detailing. “You want chiffon in May,” he said, explaining his approach. In general this season Wu was thinking about the juxtaposition of masculine and feminine details, so the lace on a slip dress came in menswear patterns like houndstooth and herringbone, and a delicate camisole was paired with a slouchy suit. Somewhat oversized proportions (adjustable via zippers that shaped the waistline of a coat and tracked up pant legs) gave the tailoring a bold, of-the-moment look, and the slips will insinuate him smack-dab in the middle of what promises to be early 2016’s biggest trend. This wasn’t necessarily revolutionary stuff, but delivering honest-to-goodness warm-weather clothes in a warm-weather month is rule-breaking enough. As for the sleeveless gown embroidered in ultraviolet flowers, it was signature Wu and inarguably lovely.
30 November 2015
With his recent turn toward tailoring and a more minimalist point of view, it’s easy to forget thatJason Wugot his start as a dressmaker. This season, he seemed eager to remind us of his origins. “Glamour” was the one-word description his show notes proffered. The first look out was a trenchcoat, sure, but its edges were softly frayed and its storm flap was ruffled. Ruffles were the big story. Cascading down the sides of a halter dress in a bright, blurry floral print and fluttering at the neckline of the show’s best look, a gorgeous coral pink cocktail number, they evokedYves Saint Laurent. Even a python-skin dress got the flounce treatment.Here and there on the shoulders of a blouse and the sides of a somewhat too-stiff woven raffia dress, those frills got the better of him. He’s no YSL (heck, probably not even Saint Laurent himself could live up to his legend now), but Wu’s output continues to mature. The work that went into the bodices of a camisole and a T-shirt dress, among other pieces, was so intricate it looked more like a print than a patchwork of five different kinds of lace. Otherwise, there was a healthy amount of the sportswear he’s come to favor lately. Wu's tailoring is confident, and a pair of black suits with delicate lace underpinnings looked great with flat, strappy sandals. Also tempting: clingy knits in a mélange tweed for day, and, for evening, in fine-ribbed silk with more of that saucy fraying.
11 September 2015
For years, shoppers have been complaining about the perplexing way stores stock merchandise. At this very minute, shops are bulking up on winter boots before half of us have even gotten around to buying sandals. Come November, when we all start thinking about warm coats, you'll find bikinis and other "vacationwear." Jason Wu is addressing the issue head-on with his new Resort collection, which has as much, if not more, fur than his Fall outing, and is rounded out with an assortment of efficiently chic wool suits and heavenly multi-ply cashmere knits. Let's hope the retailers bite and that other designers follow his lead.In recent seasons, Wu has worked to elevate his aesthetic. At first it was hard to know if the new restraint in his clothes came naturally or was a response to fashion's preoccupation with an almost clerical kind of minimalism. Several collections in, the polish of his pared-back tailoring, seen on a Le Smoking and on sheath dresses, is completely convincing. Still one couldn't help but smile when catching a glimpse of the old Jason, in a shirtdress in a black-and-white squiggle print inspired by the work of artist Ghada Amer. Think of it as an all-grown-up version of his onetime collaboration with the graffiti star KAWS.
8 June 2015
When Jason Wu was first starting out, fashion watchers liked to compare him to an upstart Oscar de la Renta. He was a precocious kid with his eye on the Park Avenue set. Over the years and after the one-two success of Michelle Obama's inauguration gowns, Wu's aesthetic shifted. The frills and the flounces disappeared; we haven't seen a feather, once one of his favorite embellishments, in seasons. These days, if there's a designer precursor for what Wu is doing, it's Michael Kors, he of the souped-up, super-luxe sportswear.An exacting tailor, Wu happens to be very good at sportswear himself. You won't find better cut trousers than the high-waisted, cropped pair he sent out with a silk tie-neck blouse in the same shade of olive green. And you can't argue with the sleek, streamlined elegance of his double-face cashmere coats. Other outerwear pieces were built with detachable linings, removable fur outer layers, or zip-off sleeves, the better to offer his clients variety and value for money. He's also happy to satisfy their more indulgent side, the case in point being a sleeveless dress made from matte crocodile, or a very authentic-looking stamped leather.There were beads and crystals, but because of their simple T-shirt shapes, his evening dresses retained the quiet, respectable feeling of the daywear. On the phone before the show, Wu name-checked Catherine Deneuve, noting, "There's something definitely glamorous about it." The belted fur coat that closed the show came closest to capturing Deneuve's glam factor. Otherwise it was hard to shake the feeling that Wu was playing things too safe. The clothes were essentially faultless, but the show wanted for some of the drama and heat of real life.For Tim Blanks' take on Jason Wu, watch this video.
13 February 2015
Dan Flavin's early work—the single color canvases, not the fluorescent lights he's famous for—lined Jason Wu's Pre-Fall mood board. They gave him his strong, saturated color palette, and informed the very subtle detailing of what is Wu's most minimal lineup yet. A year after joining Hugo Boss as artistic director, Wu's signature collection has been streamlined and overhauled. It's hard to imagine the woman who'll wear these clothes fussing about with the glossy eelskin stripes, gold bugle beads, and disco vibes of his Pre-Fall collection from last year. But if a certain no-nonsense sensibility infused the new clothes, if Wu has shrugged off fun, he hasn't abandoned luxury. The standout piece here was a sleeveless sheath in fine plonge leather in an emerald green so deep it was almost black, with a wraparound bodice and a deep front slit. Wu believes in the simplicity and sophistication of that silhouette, and it rematerialized in double-face cashmere embellished with tiny hand-tacked slits like the tracery lines on Flavin's paintings. He used the same double-face material for a shawl-collared tuxedo with wide-legged trousers that will be as comfy as your favorite sweats. A beaded T-shirt dress didn't measure up in the elegance department, but the beaded, bias-cut long slipdress had a graceful way about it.
8 December 2014
Jason Wu made headlines today with the news that he's sold a majority stake in his brand to the investment firm InterLuxe. Next up: a flagship and an expanded accessories range. Perhaps with an eye to his first store, his Spring collection played it restrained and safe. Remember the Kaws-designed graffiti print of a few years back? There was nothing quite that playful at Spring Studios this afternoon. Instead Wu opened with a beige-ish abstract brushstroke jacquard. A little bit artsy, but all grown-up. Otherwise, he preferred the simplicity of white, black, navy, and fatigue green."The one word I keep thinking isbeauty," Wu said via phone a few days ago, adding, "as usual, it's a refined take on American sportswear." He also called out Charlotte Rampling as an "invisible muse." The actress' effortless, slightly gamine sense of chic came across best in a white silk sleeveless blouse with a flounce down the front worn with full, slightly flowy trousers. Minimal suede separates in navy and limestone green had a similarly easy allure, and Karlie Kloss breathed a lot of life into her simple black silk shirtdress.As the show progressed into evening, Wu amped up the heat. Beaded bias-cut cocktail numbers were gathered at the hip and exposed flashes of skin, and the two gowns he closed with were remarkably bare, featuring bodices that plunged nearly to the navel and open backs. But even with that hit of sex, this show came across a little too refined, a little too neat. We saw those Steven Klein pictures of Wu inW; a bit more of the designer's sardonic wit wouldn't have gone amiss here.
5 September 2014
Has his short time at Hugo Boss started to rub off on Jason Wu's own line? For Resort, Wu said he was looking at the work of Dieter Rams, the German industrial designer famous for the austerely beautiful record players and radios he made for Braun in the late 1950s and sixties. Scrolling through Google images of Rams' work, Wu pointed out parallelisms: the chalky, neutral palette, the understated plastic- or leather-covered hardware. Even his familiar lace has taken on a new rigor—instead of flowers, he used a squared-off motif, a grid-like pattern that was echoed in the collection's sole print. But Wu was quick to point out this wasn't an out-and-out rethink of his signatures. "I'm playing with a ladylike aesthetic with a new set of eyes," he said.Think of it this way: Wu has grown up, and so has his customer. Yes, the Wu woman has always been sophisticated, but for Resort she'll be paring back on the frills in favor of an unadorned sleeveless sheath (lovely in a minty green) or a slim-line skirtsuit. A white zip-front shirt worn with white boot-cut trousers exemplified the clean, rather minimalist spirit of the new collection. One of its few flourishes was a wide swath of sheared mink on a sleeveless coat. Evening, too, was relatively restrained in the sense that he traded in embellishment in favor of evocative, almost grand silhouettes. Wu has been challenging himself lately, pushing his familiar look in new directions. This collection lacked some of the feminine whimsy of his previous work, which might be an adjustment for some of his followers. Still, Wu has a sure hand, as a sublime light yellow beaded cocktail dress proved. The precision of a look like that has its own seductions.
8 June 2014
Jason Wu has not one, but two shows this week. His debut collection as creative director of Hugo Boss will hit the runway next Wednesday. Before his own show today, he explained that the experience of working for the German company had him thinking about his namesake label's DNA. "It's going to be quite personal," he said of his new Fall collection.It was clear that working with Boss, a company known primarily for its menswear, had him reconsidering his own style. Wu rose to fame on two traits: a flair for the sportif and, most famously, a sophisticated dressiness that belied his youth (see both of Michelle Obama's inauguration gowns). Today's outing was no volte-face, but you did notice differences in his approach. Whereas a year ago he was all about a corset, power shoulders, and aggressive femininity, here his coats came with the rounded shoulders, full upper arms, and straight waists of forties and fifties tailoring. A peacoat slashed at the hips below four metal buttons looked great, and there was serious drama in an eggplant leather overcoat that hugged the thighs above a long embroidered chiffon skirt. Overall, the silhouette was long and lean, but not curvy the way his clothes used to be. A lilac wool crepe pantsuit conjured visions of Marlene Dietrich in full drag.The changes were even more distinct in his eveningwear. The feather confections you saw on his runway last February had already given way to beaded bias-cut slipdresses last September. Today, he dialed down the embellishments still further, letting gorgeous panne velvets in lilac and grape do the talking under oversize men's coats, draping silk chiffon and velvet devorés asymmetrically around the torso, and slipping little black camisole dresses underneath erstwhile utilitarian parkas that were bisected with industrial zips and patchworked with bits of fur. He'll score with those parkas.It wasn't all hits. But in general we liked the direction Wu took here.
6 February 2014
Jason Wu's love affair with the corset appears to be well and truly over. Following in the footsteps of a Spring collection devoted to bias dressing, he focused on draping and "hybridized" separates for Pre-Fall, with somewhat mixed results. Spiral-cut ruffle dresses in mismatched dark autumn florals looked great with mannish shoes, while foulard-print blouses came with ribbed cuffs borrowed from athletic gear—a subtle detail that gave the pieces a sporty mien. Yes, there were a few of the body-limning sheaths he's known for, but they had more ease than usual, thanks to the way he injected drape by splicing jersey knits with silk. A clingy black number with a lustrous inset in the bodice was particularly gorgeous. Wu took a similar approach to his evening suits, cutting a tuxedo jacket like a cardigan and, on the bottom, pairing it with slouchy silk track pants.It's hard to argue with a collection designed to feel, as Wu put it, as comfortable as "slipping on a sweater." There were several covetable cashmeres here, as well as an oversize ribbed style worn with a long beaded-tulle skirt. We're all for designers getting out of their comfort zones, but that look in particular was too close for comfort to Riccardo Tisci's Givenchy. A golden silk slipdress with a spiraling seam was Wu doing what he does best.
8 December 2013
Fashion has been circling around the 1990s for a season or two now. Jason Wu is the latest designer to romance the decade. As if to make his point, Karen Elson, a model who came on the scene in the late nineties, opened the show. The bias-cut dresses that followed gave us visions of Kate Moss back in the day or Carolyn Bessette-Kennedy.Wu called the collection "a dialogue between construction and ease," and the conversation produced one of his most persuasive shows in a while. In recent seasons, the designer has fetishized the notion of a power woman—all shoulder pads, corsets, and blazing attitude. For Spring, he pulled back on the strong tailoring, focusing instead on unstructured safari-style suits in fluid suede or silk crepe featuring flap pockets and snaps. They had a cool slouch, which he edged up with lacing at the lower back, an echo of previous collections.His slipdresses were streamlined and deceptively simple. Several of them turned to reveal a lace corset underneath as well as racy metal chains below the arms, connecting front to back. Whether it was that cinching or Wu's skills as a draper, they fit like a dream. Perched in the front row, Jessica Paré and Emily Mortimer appeared fairly rapt. On the more casual tip, buttoned-to-the-neck shirtdresses looked great, too.The show was also a story about light and dark, starting as it did with barely-there beiges and grays, sage green, and blush and concluding with bright flashes of midnight blue (pretty on a ribbed sweater and sequin-embroidered skirt) and black. There was a lot of sparkle here, but Wu used a light touch. All around, it was that sense of quiet effortlessness—of not trying so hard to be sexy—that made this collection seductive.
5 September 2013
Hard-edged glamour was Jason Wu's message last season. Like other designers we've seen this week, he's loosened things up considerably for Resort, elongating hems to below the knee and taking the accent off a nipped waist. His recent protestations about a dark side notwithstanding, the new lighter mood is a good fit for Wu.Despite the high level of craft that went into a sleeveless dress made from basket-weave tweed and duchesse satin connected by beaded black chiffon palm leaves, it came off as quite effortless. "I wanted to do tropical, but as shadows," he said. It was likewise nice to see him reimagine his best-selling couture sweatshirt; this time around, it came in black with a satin back and a matching satin triangle below its crew neck, or with an embroidered tulle overlay. If Wu leaned too heavily on midriff-baring tops, he's not the only one to do so this season. They've begun to feel like a cliché, but he made up for it with some chicly practical outerwear, including a khaki toggle coat with a deep band of black leather at the hem, and a patent suede coat the same shade of green as the wallpaper at Indochine, one of his favorite haunts. Maybe the best look in the collection was a denim skirtsuit that he pointed out wasn't really denim at all but blue silk with a contrasting silk lining. "Nobody comes to me for a basic denim jacket," he said. In keeping with this notion, he amped up the drama for evening, showing his first formal ball gowns in a while. Kerry Washington nabbed the yellow one for the CFDAs earlier this week.
5 June 2013
Jason Wu has gotten quite chummy with Stephanie Seymour of late. The fortysomething model, who vamped in the front row with her sons Peter and Harry today, stars in the designer's Spring ad campaign. You can Google an Inez and Vinoodh-lensed picture of Wu with his head practically in Seymour's bare-legged lap. Then there's Michelle Obama, who chose a dress by the designer for her husband's second Inauguration Ball last month, four years after she wore a Wu gown to his first, although you won't find any snapshots of the two of them palling around at La Grenouille.Anyway, those fruitful relationships could be why Wu set out to design what he called his "most womanly, most grown-up" collection to date. He called it Extreme Femininity, and he definitely set a glam scene at his Park Avenue venue, installing a massive chandelier in the middle of his square runway. In the past, he preferred whimsy—remember those KAWS-designed prints? Here, he opted for its opposite. The shoulders of his power suits certainly were assertive; they were as strong as waists were nipped. Shirts, meanwhile, were buttoned all the way to the top, with collars just grazing the chin. You couldn't call the collection restrained, not by a long shot, what with all that fur (best as black patch pockets on a caramel brown parka) and the provocative lace-printed clear plastic trenches. But the black and white color palette, with only a few shots of red (a nod in Mrs. Obama's direction?), seemed to be Wu's way of saying, "I'm getting serious."All grown-up or not, a girl still likes to let her hair down from time to time. Ask Seymour. Wu was at his most convincing here when he focused on the "femininity" of the show's title: the swingy pleats of cocktail dresses, the polka dots of a sleeveless blouse, charming point d'esprit camisoles with long trains worn over capri pants. Those were in his sweet spot. He strained harder to incorporate the "extreme" into his sensibility; in the end, that part isn't such a good fit.
7 February 2013
"There's definitely a dark side to Jason Wu," the designer told this reporter last month.Darkisn't exactly the right word for pre-fall, which is a sexy ode to Antonio Lopez and his "Girls" Jerry Hall and Grace Jones. Still, Wu's reputation for ladylike clothes must be starting to feel confining. On the runway in September, Lillian Bassman's influence sweetened the provocative Helmut Newton touches. Here, the designer was in full-on retro-fabulous mode. Bordeaux sequins were embroidered onto the black stretch tulle of a glove-tight gown, eelskin was sliced into a figure-loving dress, and mink was dyed black and white and chevroned onto a leather coat.The glam era has been done by just about every designer you can name. With the Mauricio and Roger Padilha-edited book on Antonio Lopez that was published earlier this year, we're bound to see further incarnations. Wu is treading on familiar ground, even though he did include signatures of his own like stripey knits, dressy shorts, and deluxe parkas in the mix. In any case, if his concept lacked originality, he managed to make up for it in its execution. Take a cocktail dress made from tweed overlaid with organza that was stitched in place, creating a sort of quilted effect—nobody was doing that in the seventies. In the end, it's a positive to see him pushing himself past his comfort zone.
9 December 2012
"I want to do everything forbidden, everything you don't do." Helmut Newton said that. Surprisingly perhaps, the sentiment also fits for Jason Wu's new collection, which was influenced by the Newton retrospective that ran at the Grand Palais in Paris earlier this year. Provocation isn't traditionally part of Wu's arsenal; we don't need to remind you that this is the young man who dressed Michelle Obama for the Inauguration Ball. Yet he poured it on today, accessorizing his mostly nude and black collection with leather harnesses, black net veils, and the deep red lipstick that model Nadja Auermann wore in some of Newton's famous pictures. Carolyn Murphy, who also posed for the legendary lensman, made a rare runway appearance, opening the show in a second-skin croc-stamped sheath.Lace and leather predominated and often came together, as they did on a backless black apron dress with laser-cut flowers at the hem and a fitted nude sheath with a point d'esprit bodice and tulle insets zigzagging down the torso. Lillian Bassman was another reference point, and her signature black and white images provided an x-rayed floral motif that was its own innuendo. A collaboration with the lingerie maker La Perla provided ample cause for all the sheer chiffons Wu used. Another time, a tanned and taut midriff was on full display between a lace bandeau top and kicky leather skirt.Does the dominatrix shoe fit? Some of the kink did push Wu dangerously beyond his comfort zone. The tailoring, though, was a strength. A pair of narrowly cut jumpsuits and a sleeveless blouse tucked into high-waisted stovepipe trousers hinted at the androgyny that was also famously part of Newton's oeuvre. Sexy? In spades.
6 September 2012
Taxidermy beetles with vintage watch parts inside by the artist Mike Libby were the surprising starting point for Jason Wu's pretty Resort collection. The miniature creations inspired both the bugs picked out in Swarovski crystals on a duchesse satin cocktail dress and the vibrant color palette—see Karlie Kloss' bright-red draped gown at the Met Ball and Jessica Stam's royal-blue number at the CFDAs. To complement the little creatures, he designed an oversize botanical motif that he said "looks like it's under a microscope." It appeared on a boxy tee and sleeveless dresses.As unlikely as the origin of Wu's lineup was, the results put him smack-dab in the middle of things. A week's worth of Resort appointments is confirmation enough that neons aren't going anywhere and neither are bold, look-at-me prints. If there's safety in the center, he pushed himself in other ways. Coming off a Fall collection that was all about tailoring, he challenged himself to try more draping—the special-occasion gowns he previewed on Kloss and Stam are good examples of that. Lace gowns with jet beading that Wu likened to tattoos had a new and not unwelcome edge.Wu showered his accessories with plenty of attention. Bags came in three-color combos that reflected the electric hues of the clothes, and shoes ranged from evening sandals to rhinestone-trimmed pumps to fancy flats. There were also bejeweled minaudières and utility belts. With so much merch on offer, one wondered when the first flagship store would be coming. Wu said he's waiting, for now. "I want to get it perfect," he said. "I'll do it when the time is right."
7 June 2012
With a cymbal crash, an enormous set of doors bathed in red light opened at Jason Wu and the first model stepped out wearing a military green wool cape coat overlaid in black lace, with long silk tassels dangling from her ears. We were in China. But before you go assuming that this was another grab for the Asian country's gangbusters market (Louis Vuitton's Spring '11 show comes to mind), remember that Wu was born on the neighboring island of Taiwan and didn't learn English until he was 10 and had moved to Canada.Before the show, his most confident to date, Wu explained that he went back to Taiwan a year ago with his dad and that the trip had him asking himself,What is Chinese?"It's a funny question for a Chinese person to answer," he said. Maybe that's why he came up with three different ideas. There's the military China, which inspired the Mao jackets and shirts, as well as the army green and red palette of the sportswear that dominated the collection. The belted puffy jacket with armorlike quilting on the shoulders is destined to be a hit. There's the historical China of the Qing Dynasty, which informed the lushly opulent embroideries that Wu has made his calling card—that was shaved black mink embroidered onto the front of the epaulet dress that was the show's most winning piece. And there's the thirties and forties Hollywood version of China. "Inauthentic," the designer called it."Anna May Wrong," snarked one onlooker in the audience, playing on the name of the Asian-American movie star who was often cast in the role of the "exotic" in that era. And yet, from the looks of Arizona Muse's strange tasseled hat with the gold knob on top, Wu just may be in on the joke. Certainly, the red and black lace evening dresses were more florid than anything we've seen from him before. But if those numbers will be too costumey for Wu's crowd, there was plenty of that reliably strong sportswear to march away with.
9 February 2012
Models swanning about in gowns you'll soon be seeing on a red carpet, a photographer plus assistants, hair and makeup people, a stylist, and another person on lint roller patrol…That was the scene at Jason Wu's studio. Pre-fall, in case you remain unconvinced, is every bit as big—and important—a collection as Fall itself. "They are four equal seasons now," said Wu. "This one, like the others, is about giving our girl luxury clothes. There's nothing watered down." Really, how could there be when Wu's inspirations were Indian maharajas and the colorful illustrations of Charley Harper, an artist noted for his bold, graphic depictions of nature?Wu's Spring experiment in "edgy" appears to have been short-lived. "Regal" was the word he used here, and it fit. Not only were his evening dresses hand-embroidered—a strapless black gazar with green beading on the bodice and a silk georgette halter gown with a sequined collar were standouts—but so was daywear. Both his camel-hair cape and his burgundy trench boasted jet beads and paillettes at the shoulders, while a long-sleeve black sheath with an "exploded houndstooth" print down the front was in fact densely stitched with sequins. Even casual pieces got the royal treatment; a sporty striped sweater, for example, came in a loose crocheted weave.In October, Target announced that Jason Wu will design a limited-edition collection for the retailer. One thing's for certain: There will be no mistaking these clothes for that high-low collaboration launching in February.
1 December 2011
Jason Wu, edgy? At a preview of his collection, he said he was taking more chances this season and cited KAWS, the graffiti artist who came to fame in the nineties for inking up bus-shelter ads of Kate Moss, as a major source of inspiration. That wasn't just lip service. Wu collaborated with KAWS on the flower-petal print that dominated his show. But that's not to say that there was anything truly "street" on the runway today. This is a designer beloved by red-carpet starlets and First Lady Michelle Obama, just as savvy at business as he is at sewing a buttonhole. Upper-thigh-baring sport shorts aside, pretty and proper is what Wu does, and this Spring collection was no exception.Where he did push boundaries was in the areas of fabric innovation and embellishment. Regarding the former, Wu chose a nearly weightless nylon "that moves like chiffon" for his outerwear. In ballerina pink, the parka would be a cool alternative to the predictable evening shawl. The gazar he used for his Cristobal Balenciaga-esque flared-skirt dress, meanwhile, was not only ultralightweight but also came in a heather gray the color of your favorite old T-shirt (the same shade, it so happens, as his best-selling black lace-sleeve sweatshirt from Fall). Last season's rococo gold bullion embroideries were out, and in their place were Nerds candy-shaped beads sewn onto shirt collars. "Old-school techniques that look electrocuted," was how Wu described the effect.Sounds weird, but it was charming. And the young celeb set will find those flirty shorter-in-the-front, longer-in-the-back ball skirts seductive, too. Knowing just how far to push things may be one of Wu's most valuable gifts.
8 September 2011
Jason Wu's empire is growing at a clip. Three seasons ago, the designer introduced accessories to his namesake collection; now he's turning out a larger crop of them than ever, and he's nominated for the Swarovski Award for emerging accessories designer at tonight's CFDA Awards, too. For Resort, he's introduced his first swimwear. It gelled with the summery vibe of his entire collection, inspired by a New Year's trip to Puerto Rico and the vibrant colors of Old San Juan.Wu is in a scuba state of mind, a not unusual condition among designers of late. The dual influences of sea and sport suffused not only the new bandeau bikini tops and zip-front maillots, but his off-the-sand clothes, too. The delicate blouses he's made a staple came piped with electric yellow trim. Little silk "surf shorts" were paired with Art Deco-ish flower-printed tops in his new twist on the summer suit. And the colors of the collection—not only yellow but coral and Caribbean blue as well—were unmistakably beach-y. His twist on the Baja sweater was a hoodie, but a hoodie classed up à la Wu, in double-faced cashmere with lace trim.Even with his double-digit growth—this Resort collection, he revealed, is twice the size of last year's—Wu continues to buck against the perception of his work as simply fancy-lady chic. This outing, he said, "is a way to dress my girl down but still have a sense of dressed up." Just one more new frontier for Wu—even if you suspect he's still more comfortable up than down.
2 June 2011
We lost count somewhere around 90 when we tried to tally the photographers in the pit at Jason Wu's Chelsea show today. The designer's rise has been fairly meteoric, thanks in part to Michelle Obama, of course. But it struck you, looking at his Fall collection: The clothes are legitimately living up to his outsized reputation. Wu's always been about a polished, preternaturally ladylike look. What was noteworthy about this outing was how consistent it was, and how well his "baroque meets sportswear" message (inspired, he said, by a Robert Polidori book on the 25-year restoration of Versailles) held together from beginning to end.Like last season, the designer put a big emphasis on tailoring. He opened with a charcoal gray coat flung over the shoulders of a cropped jacket, printed blouse, and cigarette pants. But this wasn't your average wool flannel coat; it came with a strip of black lace down each sleeve. In fact, Wu made lace, which is shaping up to be an early New York trend, an integral part of this collection. The storm flap of another coat was swathed in the delicate stuff. By embroidering little bits of it onto blouses or A-line, slightly above-the-knee skirts, he engineered it to look like a print. And for evening, he embellished a gold lace gown with thousands of metallic sequins and paillettes.That wasn't the only place he went for baroque. When a jacket or a coat-dress or a shirtdress wasn't embroidered with lace, it was embellished with dense clusters of colorful stones. (Odile Gilbert painted gold-leaf pigment into the models' updos to match.) And Wu reprised his signature feather pouf cocktail dresses in both black and nude, the show's dominant colors.If there's a critique to be leveled, it's the absence of sex. When the new designers at Valentino do this sort of thing, there can be a charged, even dirty undercurrent. Here it read mostly as prim. The word Wu himself used was "austere." But we quibble. There's no denying that this ambitious designer has a hit on his hands.
10 February 2011
The Séeberger brothers—street-style photographers, albeit of the early twentieth century, rather than the early twenty-first—gaveJason Wuhis jumping-off point for the season. (This was only his second pre-fall collection, by the way, and already more than twice the size of his first.) The duo snapped photos of demimondaines posing as gamely in their self-styled finery as any latter-day contender like Giovanna Battaglia or Caroline Sieber, and their era provided a reference point for the thirties-inspired separates and Art Deco details that ran through this solid collection.The palette here was moodier than Spring's, almost overcast: Even pop colors like salmon and violet were tinged with gray. Picking through current trends, Wu offered a silk shirt, color-blocked knits and dresses, and moments of militaria and menswear—all gussied up, of course, with ladylike flair. A cotton twill parka was detailed along the back and sleeves with lace and glittering beads. The "basic shirt" chez Wu? It's lace. The "houndstooth" striping on skirts and dresses? Actually a mini floral print. There were ruffle-skirted party dresses for the longtime devotees, but increasingly, sportswear—of the Geoffrey Beene variety, a designer he mentions frequently—is Wu's bag. And speaking of those: The accessories launched last season are back, with two new handbag shapes and several cigarette-heeled shoe styles, too.
5 December 2010
Speaking via phone the day before showing his collection, Jason Wu hinted that "Spring is more dangerous." That was a surprising statement, and perhaps one that shouldn't be taken literally from a designer whose trump card is his retail savvy; on a selling trip to Paris in July, he added 30 new stores to a roster that already boasted 120—not a bad tally at all for a brand that's just four years old. Equally impressive: Today's show was the official launch of his full range of accessories—shoes, bags, and optical.Continuing the push into tailoring that he began for Fall, Wu opened the show with a sleeveless bow-front top tucked into a pair of high-waisted pants. Smartly cut lean trousers made appearances in several different colors and were paired with ladylike blouses or neat striped knits. Jackets, too, were elongated, a couple just substantial enough to function as dresses. His black anorak looked like satin, but was actually techno twill. You could toss it over an evening gown and not worry if you found yourself in a downpour.The danger, and we're speaking relatively here, came in the form of amped-up colors and mixed prints inspired by the work of the Brazilian artist Beatriz Milhazes, plus a generous helping of sex appeal. The retailers who've gone mad for blouses will have to come up with some solutions for all the see-through ones the designer showed. But all in all, this was a focused collection that will continue to add extra zeroes to Wu's bottom line.
9 September 2010
Jason Wu returned to the St. Regis hotel, site of his Spring 2010 show, to present his new collection. On each guest's chair was a box of macaroons made by Alain Ducasse's restaurant Adour, downstairs. "Resort should be like dessert," the Swarovski Womenswear Award nominee said. Specifically, a French one. There was a Parisian flavor to the collection, from the Coco-esque straw boaters to the tweedy skirtsuits to the sailor-stripe sweaters and full menswear pants. On the garçon-ish side of the equation, Wu had a couple of the shorts suits that have quickly turned into a big Resort trend. As any Michelle Obama-watcher knows, though, sweet little dresses are this designer's stock-in-trade. The best today came in a persimmon-hued, pressed daffodil-printed short-sleeve style with a mille-feuille skirt. The pattern appeared later on breezy, bias-cut chiffon gowns with ruffle-edged plunging-V backs. But with its elbow-length sleeves and the very French jabot at the neck, the dove gray floor-scraper (the same color as those delicious macaroons, as it happens) was the freshest evening look. If the mixed reviews he received for Fall gave Wu pause, there was no sign of it here in this assured collection.
3 June 2010
With their electric colors and abbreviated hemlines, the Spring clothes that Jason Wu showed last September sent a clear message: Grateful as he was for the attention he received after Michelle Obama wore his gown on inauguration night, he didn't want to become recognized for just one kind of look. Now, for Fall, he seems determined to move even further from the princess dresses that were his first claim to fame. If the results were occasionally uneven, you can't fault the 27-year-old designer's impulse to expand the scope of what he's known for."There's a big menswear message and a big outerwear message," he said a couple of days before his show. The starting point for his short-sleeve jackets, oversize cashmere coats, boxy mohair sweaters, and fold-over trousers was Irving Penn—the man himself, not his works. Plaid jackets and crisp white shirts were the late photographer's daily uniform. Here, they had an appealing, shrugged-on sensibility that suggests Wu has noticed the movement elsewhere in fashion toward clean, spare classics.Penn's photographs were also an influence, as it turned out, evident in some of the collection's key prints. Those aren't polka dots on that strapless shantung bubble dress, they're a reproduction of a cigarette-burn print. Cast-off negatives of chemical spills, meanwhile, inspired the gold leafing on Wu's duchesse satin sheaths. It didn't all work: Some experiments in eveningwear, namely a pair of black hand-draped Chantilly lace dresses, lacked the effervescent quality of Wu's best designs. But he was back to form with an off-the-shoulder dress with pheasant feathers trapped between layers of tulle, as well as an almost weightless plume-print silk tulle strapless style. It's a pity the West Chelsea venue wasn't better lit to allow a closer look.
11 February 2010
Jason Wu reported at his pre-fall presentation that sales of his resort line have been brisk, with, he says, 50 to 60 percent sell-throughs in just three weeks. There's no denying that the 27-year-old designer is hot, but the important thing is that he's intent on not just coasting along. There's his new 9,000-square-foot Garment District showroom and studio, for starters. And then there's his pre-fall lineup itself, which has a harder edge than his fans may be used to, thanks in part to his use of leather, a material he's working with for the first time. The collection's showpiece is a silver leather cocktail number laser-cut with a feathering technique that makes it look like panne velvet. It's available in an "editorial" 18-inch length, as well as a more conservative 23-inch option, like all of his dresses. Wu also made a big push into separates. A "two-in-one" short-sleeve sweater with a long-sleeve jersey knit built in underneath topped a mini, which was made from sequins that had been bent and covered with chiffon to evoke feathers. Sharp-looking blazers, meanwhile, were cinched with leather belts and paired with short shirtdresses or skirts. Positive developments, all around.
7 December 2009
Backstage, Jason Wu said he wants to keep challenging himself technically. The way he set out to do that for Spring was to take casual, everyday pieces of American sportswear and re-create them in beautiful, super-luxe fabrics. The process seemed to produce a newfound playfulness in the designer—some of the clothes were almost quirky. Early on, for example, there was a sweat suit complete with a hood in navy tweed, and a roomy forties-ish romper in denim silk. Later he paired a tulip skirt with a black tee striped in multicolor Swarovski crystals. Hair and makeup that evoked Daphne Guinness added another touch of eccentricity.When it came to the evening portion of the show, though, Wu was mostly back in earnest mode. He loves a one-shoulder dress, and you can hardly fault him: Michelle Obama, of course, wore a one-shoulder gown of his design to the Inaugural Balls last year. The examples in his show today were knee-length, but they came in all sorts of fabrics, from high-drama gold faille with a 3-D sculpted sash to a younger, cheekier aqua-and-black point d'esprit. As he did for Resort, Wu really let it rip when it came to colors, mixing the blushing pink feathers of a strapless number with an electric-lime-green ribbon belt, and violet with candy-apple red on a bustier dress. The only thing challenging about these party dresses will be keeping front-row starlets like Kerry Washington from clamoring to wear them. This show was a confident leap forward for the 26-year-old designer.
10 September 2009
Jason Wu has been riding a wave of increasing exposure and sales since Michelle Obama wore his white gown to the inauguration balls, so why mess with a good thing? Held at Robert De Niro's Greenwich Hotel, Wu's Resort show was full of reliably pretty dresses, among them a print chiffon frock peeking from underneath a navy trench and a short strapless number in three-dimensional petals. What really felt fresh, though, was the lemon silk shantung blazer that he opened with, as well as the blue tweed pantsuit he sent out a little later on. They weren't necessarily the first pieces of tailoring Wu has ever put on the runway, but they conveyed a message. The Swarovski Award for Womenswear nominee (he'll vie for the prize on June 15 against Alexander Wang and Thakoon Panichgul) is clearly intent on expanding his range.
3 June 2009
Jason Wu's life changed overnight when Michelle Obama wore the 26-year-old designer's one-shoulder organza-embroidered white chiffon gown to the inaugural balls. The crowd at today's show was larger (sorry, folks, no First Lady), and there were more big-time editors in the front row, but Wu didn't change his pretty, polished formula. He said he was inspired by fairy tales, particularly a book of illustrations by Arthur Rackham that he had as a child. His focus, now more than ever, was dresses. A princess gown with sweeping skirts in midnight blue and silver point d'esprit closed the show, and before that came a pair of memorable body-skimming sheaths, the more dramatic in a gray cashmere mini-check with lacy black epaulets, as well as a couple of away-from-the-body flapper numbers, and two cartridge-pleated dresses in chartreuse and violet with jet beading at the hems. Any one of those would please a princess of the Park Avenue variety (assuming such a creature still exists). If there were a shortage of outerwear and other cold-weather-appropriate clothes, save for a striking electric-blue tiered faille opera coat with embroidered sleeves, can you blame him? After all, Wu's just giving the retailers—three times as many as last season have booked appointments—what they want. As a fledgling designer in this kind of economy, that's smart business.
12 February 2009
Since he launched his label three years ago, it's seemed as if Jason Wu has been auditioning to replace Oscar de la Renta or Carolina Herrera. He certainly has the immaculate Park Avenue thing down cold, should either of the legends decide to step down. But for Spring, inspired by a trip to Japan, where his business has been growing like gangbusters, Wu added an element of quirky whimsy that should broaden his appeal beyond the young ladies-who-lunch set. It came through in the form of a fuchsia cashmere T-shirt worn with an embroidered, dotted micro-pleat skirt, and again in the mix-and-match neons of a cardigan, a bow-front blouse, and a full A-line skirt. Not that the designer skimped on the ladylike numbers upon which he's built his socialite client base—French knot embroideries and Swarovski crystals decorated a white silk faille coat and a creamy organza dress, both of which erred on the prim side of polished. For the money, a fits-like-a-glove black-on-white floral tapestry sheath was a standout. The evening gowns in jewel-tone chiffon that closed the show successfully walked the line between Wu's two worlds. You could imagine an Olivia Chantecaille, who sat in his front row, wearing the emerald green dress with diamonds and heels, but the right downtown girl could also pull it off with flat sandals, a stack of gold bangles on both wrists, and a tan.
4 September 2008
With Resort, Jason Wu continued the exploration into daywear and separates that he began last season. This isn't to say that Wu has abandoned his love affair with confectionary gowns and tulle. Both a pleated dress in red and pink makeup shades and a raw-edged mint-and-ecru number with hand-tucked details prove otherwise. However, rounding out the after-eight selection was practical daytime fare: high-gauge knits, cardi-jackets with grosgrain-covered buttons, and full-legged pants. The designer should (pardon the pun) woo new customers with this collection.
5 June 2008
Jason Wu picked up the Fashion Group International's Rising Star Award for women's ready-to-wear last month. Watching his Fall collection, it wasn't hard to see why. Just five seasons in, the 25-year-old's clothes display a sophistication of hand and of sensibility that have won him a loyal following of young socialites and starlets. For fall, it looks as though he'd like to extend his reach to working women—as-yet-untested territory for this designer. Among the cocktail and party dresses he loves to design were wide-leg, oversize herringbone trousers worn with silky bow-front blouses. And he showed his first-ever knits: snug sweaters topping full, calf-skimming skirts. Though pretty enough, these inevitably invoked Miuccia Prada's influential resort collection, as did the floral prints he used for deb dresses with soft V-necks, twisted bodices, and flaring skirts. In contrast, a pair of micropleat dresses—one strapless and to the knee and the other a belted, floor-length halter style—had a fresh appeal all Wu's own.
31 January 2008
The Wu label, now in its fourth season, is slowly crystallizing into the sort worn by a well-groomed young lady with a penchant for immaculate details, the kind of girl who could be a future couture customer if she plays her career (or matrimonial) cards right. Grace Kelly is by now a bit of a careworn reference in the fashion world, but that's just who Wu's Spring show brought to mind: a contemporary version of the movie icon as she appeared inRear Window.Wu played to his customer with a pretty and well-constructed collection, keeping his waists high (and punctuated with narrow patent belts), his silhouettes lean (save for a few circle skirts of the 1950's-Kelly ilk), and his shapes classic (the sheath, the trench, the strapless tea-length cocktail dress). For the first time, he introduced pattern to his previously more restrained color palette, with hand-painted prints inspired by René Gruau, the illustrator eulogized inThe Guardianas the "chief visualiser" to the great couturier Christian Dior. Bold and graphic, these had a strong impact in cherry red, acid yellow, and electric blue.The show closed with a series of evening gowns, the most impressive of which was a mottled-gray chiffon number hand-sewn from a tremendous 55 yards of fabric, all cut on the bias. It was a demonstration of craftsmanship that not many twentysomething designers could have pulled off.
4 September 2007
Jason Wu is earning his wings. In a few short seasons, he's defined his customer and garnered attention from key press (Vogue) and retailers (Saks Fifth Avenue) along the way. This show should help speed his upward trajectory.Though still more deb than Kate Moss (one of Wu's alleged muses), Fall was discernibly edgier than previous seasons. A strapless cocktail piece and several belted coats were dressed down in a fine basket-weave fabric that mimicked dark denim. Metal buttons peeked from beneath plackets, half-exposed for a bit of whimsy, and the lines of a potentially stuffy dress were broken in the back with soft pleats. Wu's strength is his immaculate tailoring—a solid foundation for beautiful clothing. Look for young socials and starlets to start appearing in his front row sooner rather than later.
5 February 2007
Although 23-year-old Jason Wu designs dolls as well as clothes (hip dolls, that is—recent efforts include RuPaul and Amanda Lepore figures), his spring show displayed a great deal of maturity, with its focus on tasteful eveningwear in white, blush, and black. Wu's take on the omnipresent trapeze was discriminating: One faille coatdress had a princess line, and a shantung jacket had a Watteau back. Hems were often asymmetrical. He picked up on the ballet theme seen elsewhere this spring with pale tulle Degas dresses, and he offered several variations on the must-have navy blue evening gown. With only two collections under his belt, this Parsons- and Narciso Rodriguez–trained designer is still toying with his aesthetic, but the major stores are starting to take notice, and it'll be interesting to see how he plays his next hand.
14 September 2006