Holly Fulton (Q4291)
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Holly Fulton is a fashion house from FMD.
| Language | Label | Description | Also known as |
|---|---|---|---|
| English | Holly Fulton |
Holly Fulton is a fashion house from FMD. |
Statements
Holly Fulton is back in the room—and she designed that room, too. After a hiatus she described as “a gap year, to take stock,” Fulton returned to London Fashion Week with a presentation at the Institute of Contemporary Arts. Next month, the designer turns 40, and that big birthday has catalyzed a shift.Vogueis not in the business of reviewing sofas, rugs, urns, or pillows—but here we shall have to. Fulton spent some of her time away cultivating relationships with companies which, through collaboration, allowed her to extend her aesthetic to home furnishings, and they looked punchily good.“It’s a kinda Memphis, Biba, Deco mash-up,” she said, summarizing the sporty but intensely patterned knitwear developed with John Smedley—a company which I reckon ties with Missoni as the best knitwear marque on the planet—and her own-studio-produced silk separates. They fair sizzled with graphic intensity in patterns drawn by Fulton and semi-catalyzed by a gap year project hand-drawing new designs for a Robert Lorimer house in Scotland. The zebra prints and kaleidoscopic circles swirled out onto those sofas, upon which the models faded at this presentation in kinetic camouflage. The arrow and skull design rugs and zingily bordered crockery and urns complemented the graphic craziness. A Fulton-designed life might not be restful, but it would certainly be full. And her midlife insight that the extension from fashion into interior design might be a fruitful source of employ for her talent with pattern rings true. There was only one question left: What does one do with an urn? “I think I’d have my ashes put in that one when it all ends,” replied the designer. Holly, lifebeginsat 40.
18 September 2017
Preparing her debut Resort collection, saidHolly Fulton, demanded she flex her creativity in a new and satisfying way: “We set out to do something a bit more commercial. And I’m not known for being rampantly commercial.” Fulton listened to feedback from her best customers and partners, then tweaked her practice. She pared back the embellishment, retained the print, focused on her most successful shapes, and produced much of the collection in cotton (because that’s what the customers said they wanted). “I really like the challenge of doing something within a certain price point. And it was very interesting shooting the collection with just one model, Lorna Foran; the way she interpreted the collection was fascinating.”Winners on the rail included the light cotton-canvas separates in a graphic hubbub of crazy-mosaic stripes, denim pieces paneled with the same canvas, embroidered sweats and silks featuring two Art Deco party girl characters, light organza skirts and dresses in a faded monochrome gingham, some vibrant intarsia knit polos and sweaters produced with John Smedley, pajama suits in kaleidoscope florals, and a fluted pouf dress decorated with dyed crystal-peppered flowers. Ah, so there was embellishment? But of course, just a bit less than on Fulton’s runway. A sleeveless dress with a collar and front spine of florals pieced together in a delicate jigsaw of wooden beads was a standout example.
21 June 2016
Paisley, bell sleeves, and a palette that evoked the decade of the oil crisis and shag-pile carpets all came together atHolly Fultonthis afternoon in a collection based on a backward glance. That glance was directed at David Inshaw’s 1973 paintingThe Badminton Game—whose maxi dress–wearing women, Fulton noted with relish backstage, were reputedly the objects of the artist’s affections. The designer drew her colors—olive, brown, eggplant, and russet—from the picture and let it propel her through a typically Fultonian exercise in off-kilter maximalism.Velvet dungarees over a chiffon bell-sleeve shirt, a parka, then two zip-up wide-collar jumpsuits were the opening canvas for a monochrome movement peppered with cutout paisley teardrops drawn, Fulton said, from traditional Scottish versions of the (originally Indian) pattern. A white organza skirt was overlaid with three vertical panels of organza shaped to meander in and out, while the black high-neck knit above it featured cable detailing that wandered similarly, glinting with Swarovski insinuations. A jacquard of pink, overlaid with gold, overlaid with darkly violet teardrops was used in a high-waist bomber; the arcing fullness of its collar picked up on the paisley motif. Two mighty chiffon dresses—one worn on its own, one over wide pants, echoing the silhouettes of Inshaw’s badminton-playing women—fluttered with contrasting colored teardrop panels attached to them by jeweled pins. Plastic quills tipped with velvet balls made a striking accessory on the cross-body straps of embellished treasure chest–shaped handbags and, later, layered across a few closing looks. The (anti)climax was a brown velvet Bardot neck jumpsuit with two counterintuitive upturns at the rib cage. “I like things when they’re a little wrong,” said Fulton. And this was mostly right.
20 February 2016
To witness a designer evolve, improve, and flourish is one of the greatest pleasures of regular show attendance. TodayHolly Fultonhit that career-narrative uplift with a collection that put away some of the childish (albeit diverting) tics she had previously favored for a focused yet imaginatively soaring kaleidoscope of clothing. Her inspiration was the artist Eileen Agar—a name shamefully new to this reviewer—who collaged repetitive patterns taken from nature.Hence the calligraphic ruffles on the starfish-studded opening dresses that echoed the languidly spiraling tail of a seahorse. Or the injection-molded abstract floral silicon appliqués and glinting Swarovski, proto–Chaos Theory myriads that danced across these carefully proportioned silhouettes. Fulton’s feel for harmonic color combinations was in tune, and she paid rewarding diligence to often-overlooked categories that included an exactly precise denim and chambray section.Previously, Fulton was lovable for the walk-of-shame, tousled fierceness—very London—that so often inflected itself in her collections. Today that was eclipsed by unapologetic virtuosity. Backstage Fulton said: “We were trying to use repetition to create cohesion that reflected the almost psychedelic eccentricity of Agar. My favorite quote from her is ‘I’ve enjoyed life and it shows through, like a transparent skirt’—she basically spent many of her latter years being semi-naked in translucent garments—and we tried to incorporate that idea of something strong, feminine, and light.”
19 September 2015
Looking to party smartly? Then consider Holly Fulton's brand of good-time clothes with idiosyncratic depth. Old lady fabrics—practically upholstery—strewn with powdery and quaintly chaste florals jarred on frocks of daring lengths (for old ladies) with hints of lace and even latex curling south of the hem. Maximal accessories included octagonal shades and hair clips that matched the Art Deco profile and cat silhouette motifs (drawn from the credits of a deeply obscure but excellent 1980s British TV Roald Dahl spin-off,Tales of the Unexpected). There were touches of Biba as well as Baba Beaton, Cecil's sybaritic sister. One coat looked like a theater curtain mid-unfurl, revealing a slipdress beneath. Pockets were picked at to resemble roses, necklines were heaped with crystal, and there was more interesting scalloping than in all of Morecambe Bay. "I've never really been much for minimalism," said Fulton, reasonably.These are pieces conceived with commitment, whose references are not tacked on but thought through with a studious if magpie joyfulness: particular clothes for party-hard girls.
21 February 2015
Holly Fulton's Spring '15 was, as the show notes explained, an ode to sun-worship, folk art, and free expression. This came through in places, like on a forest green T-shirt printed with a big orange sun, and in Fulton's lovely, crafty skirts, which were handwoven with ribbon. Backstage, the designer said they were her most labor-intensive pieces to date. A tea-length button-down dress in a black and white floral print was a bit kooky and fun. Similarly, Fulton's crop tops, paired with fluid pleated trousers or voluminous princess skirts, were sweet and fresh. Same goes for a pale yellow jacket, which was embellished with black chevrons and taxi checks.Most of the collection, however, looked a bit like something your grandmother's quilting group would wear to a rave. One has to appreciate the craftsmanship that Fulton puts into each of her garments. The floral and geometric embellishments that appeared on everything from jackets to fluffy picnic frocks to dresses in swinging '60s silhouettes must have taken ages. But they seemed stodgy on Fulton's otherwise pretty confections. A blue satin jacket, shown with a floral tube top and a PVC skirt, was too big—why have the model reveal her taught tummy if you're just going to hide it underneath a boxy topper?The off-the-shoulder style that Fulton experimented with throughout was stiff and unflattering—her dresses, most of which also boasted thick straps, would have been more successful without a cuff across their chests. "I love the naiïveté of it. It reminds me of my early collections, when you don't think about commerciality and you just do what you like," said Fulton of Spring's folk-art theme. She should have considered commerciality a bit more, because with a few revisions, lots of girls would like to wear her handcrafted designs. Her finale dress, a V-neck number with floral appliqués blooming down the bodice, was going in the right direction—simple, feminine, and still special.
13 September 2014
Holly Fulton knows she's no minimalist; she allowed as much backstage while dressed in a blouse from her new collection. Its stylized gingko motif fell on the classic end of a print spectrum that combined craftsmanship with machines.This mechano-Deco idea functioned as a visual metaphor to express the way Fulton works—drawing her graphics by hand, cutting the fabric by machine, and then doing appliqués on the pieces by hand to close the production loop. It all sounds rather esoteric (likewise, the reference to Dziga Vertov'sMan With a Movie Camera) when, in fact, the collection was all sorts of fun. Hand patterns were a trend at the Paris men's shows last month, and they were a triple entendre in Fulton terms (she once dreamed of being a hand model, and her love of accessories design played out as dimensional chain bracelets adorning an oversize, manicured-hand appliqué on several skirts). In one version, the hand was clutching an old-school cell phone. But that notion is not nearly as throwback as the nuts, cogs, lightning bolts, and exclamation points that conjured up Fritz Lang'sMetropolisvia Lurex intarsia sweaters.Fulton's bonded pattern play was so magnetic that her construction—tailored topcoats, forgiving drop-waist dresses, pleated kilts—became the secondary story line, even if it was the solid foundation on which the horn and crystal surface details sat. It might be too much to ask Fulton to dial back the ornamentation; doing less can be daunting.
14 February 2014
Holly Fulton's Spring muse was the pop star Noosha Fox, of the U.K.-based band Fox, who also provided the show's opening soundtrack. With the first models coming out in sideswept hair, denim pinafores, and Swedish Hasbeens, a fresh 1970s vibe was quickly established. Flowers appeared as serene, powdery prints or artfully embroidered on dresses, jackets, and blouses. Fish prints appeared as well, which collided nicely with the floral. Of course, it wouldn't be a Holly Fulton show if there weren't some eye-popping geometrics, but they were much softer now, in paler tones and embellished in crystals.Different from seasons past, there was some structure to Fulton's flow, via a brilliant boned dress in black and white and some short, boxy jackets. Similarly strong were the accessories. (Don't forget, Fulton considers herself equal part accessories designer.) The fan-shaped handbags, orchid-detailed chokers, and necklaces were brilliant. And we must give a nod to the elasticized-waist "track" pants: The elastic did not deter from the tailoring at all, and it means that carbs are back on the menu!If she faltered at all, it was with a few pieces in a color called Tangerine Fish. On paper, that sounds intriguing, but they were a dull brown that brought down the separates they were teamed with. That weakness was quickly forgiven, though, by a showpiece dress made from cork and embellished with crystals, and jackets whipped up from tinsel. Fulton isn't just a print innovator, she's a pretty sharp hand at fabric, too.
13 September 2013
Holly Fulton, the soft-spoken Scot with a compulsion for more-is-more prints, said backstage that her collection was about "the obsessive love that a groupie has for her rock star, all the paraphernalia she collects, and her utter, slavish devotion to her object of desire." Fulton's appointed groupie was apparently Béatrice Dalle, the French gap-toothed eighties actress who will forever be known as the bonkers title character inBetty Blue,a film that charted her character's descent into madness.A series of Fulton's signature geometric looks opened the show, consolidating her position as a print activist. True to her DNA, there were some bold combinations: a windowpane print blouse paired with a pencil skirt covered in hearts; M.C. Escher-esque geometric cubes combined with a photo-realistic tiger; and another pencil skirt with a standout motif of gigantic lipstick tubes offset by a fuzzy sweater with a jeweled neck.But Fulton also showed her restrained side, with pieces like an exquisite knife-pleated leather dress with intricate embroidery and cutout waist detail, and a floor-length silk skirt topped by a screen-printed foil T-shirt. The best look came near the end in the form of a luxurious powder blue chinoiserie trouser suit (surprisingly for Fulton, accompanied by a matching fur). The suggestion was that the groupie had snared her prey to become a pampered rock-star wife.This was a confident outing for Fulton, one of this year's winners of the Fashion Forward prize. Over the seasons, she has remained true to her Art Deco, occasionally OTT prints, no matter which way the fashion winds blew. This collection may reward her with some new fans.
16 February 2013
Count Holly Fulton among the London designers newly inspired by L.A. This past March, Fulton took her first ever trip to the City of Angels, and she swept both its Hollywood flimflam and its wide-open vistas into her epic good cheer. Her new collection emphasized West Coast blue, and like SoCal's endless, cluttered skyline, there was lots of stuff here vying for your attention. Giant roses. Tiny naked ladies. Dresses made out of see-through plastic or upholstery cane. The clothes were frequently ridiculous, but they were also, improbably, convincing. Fulton's charm is her conviction—if she decides to make a motif of roses, well, those roses are going to be the most poptastic ones you've ever seen. In this instance, the roses were primarily photorealistic and collaged onto clothes in surreal, out-of-scale ways. The naked ladies were another key theme, with Fulton creating a smile-inducing chevron print from illustrated pinup girls that she applied to casual looks redolent of fifties diner-and-drive-through American suburbia. Elsewhere, she went upscale and sleek, making (relatively) pared-back pencil dresses marked by python detailing and skin-flashing cutouts. Fulton advanced her own idiosyncratic vocabulary in subtle ways here. Her Deco graphics, for instance, were shorn of their signature black lines, and so receded into the background of her designs. A lot of pieces on the runway this season felt experimental—a remarkable pink plastic dress covered in photorealistic raffia roses, for one—and Fulton acknowledged, after her show, that she mostly made those pieces because creating them was fun. The mood was contagious.
14 September 2012
With her eye-popping graphic style, more-is-more approach to color and embellishment, and overall campy attitude, Holly Fulton practically dares you to hate her clothes. Somehow, that proves impossible. The collection Fulton showed this morning was a case in point: Rainbow-hued and covered in ecstatic hothouse-inspired patterns, the clothes had a certain irrepressible chic. They were about as hard to dislike as a milkshake.In some ways, this was Fulton at her most circumspect. Embellishment was kept to a relative minimum; silhouettes were simple and sophisticated. Working with a canvas of A-line minidresses, turtlenecks, boxy jackets, tailored sheaths, and pencil skirts, Fulton applied her prints in a painterly way, working with the garments' shapes. That made for some knockout evening looks, such as a hot pink, butterfly-print sheath with a crisscrossed, body-baring bodice, and a high-necked, frond-printed turquoise minidress with a tasteful drip of crystal on the sleeve. There were also a few looks with a hot rod placement print and shots of patent leather that, however redolent of Spring '12 Prada, fit easily into the Fulton idiom and just plain worked. Elsewhere, Fulton sent out some very convincing daywear, in particular her artful intarsia-knit cardigans and sweaters. For all their punch, the knits were really very accessible. Decorous, almost. Only the most militant minimalist could hate them.
20 February 2012
Holly Fulton is a fashion maximalist. She also revels in bad taste—and she'll admit as much herself. "I love it," she said after her show this afternoon. "Stupendous bad taste, it totally inspires me." What makes Fulton compelling is that she doesn't do camp; her affection for the gauche is totally sincere. Her strategy is to take the cringe-worthy and make it chic. That's a tough trick, but Fulton has a habit of pulling it off, as she did again this season.Fulton's latest collection was inspired by, as she explained, the idea of a woman who blows her vacation budget on clothes, and so instead of heading to Saint-Tropez, goes to the tacky English resort town of Margate. She treated the seaside theme very literally, applying shells and shell laminate as embellishment, and creating an aquarium print and embroideries based on coral. There were also crystals, checkerboard and zebra motifs, and foulard prints, as well as the Deco-esque illustration that is a Fulton trademark. As noted, she's a maximalist.That decor was often applied with relative restraint, as on a fitted sheath with a black-and-white placement print that combined the Deco, zebra, and checkerboard themes, and that had turquoise raffia strung along its hemline, or on a silk halter dress with squares of shell laminate arrayed around the neckline and an aquarium print floating down by the floor. Fulton's best look—the super-short A-line dress that closed the show—was even more pithy, claiming only a witty print that combined zebra and seashells. Somehow, it was terribly elegant, in a mid-sixties aristo way.Fulton likes to cite the influence of Versace, and like Gianni Versace, she's got the right touch with a bombshell look. The killer in that department was a white patent leather miniskirt embroidered all over with coral-shaped raffia and worn with an abbreviated, zebra-patterned strapless top. The top, it turned out, was an intarsia knit, part of a group of knitwear the designer introduced this season. Women who are intimidated by Fulton's more over-the-top pieces may find themselves gravitating to those knits—they had a graphic pop, and could put the right finishing touch of bad taste on an otherwise impeccable outfit.
17 September 2011
Add Holly Fulton to the list of young Londoners this week experimenting with that most classic of English fabrics, tweed. Her initial inspiration was Coco Chanel visiting Scotland with her beau, the Duke of Westminster. But the terrific thing about this city's designers is that they're so steeped in heritage, there's no need to fetishize and take it all so seriously.Fulton opened with a bumblebee black-and-yellow tweed cut into a flippy skirt and a shift, both with swingy beaded trim; there was also a fur-hemmed coat worn with only a brassiere and spike-trimmed tuxedo pants. A windowpane camel skirt came in patent leather with spikes.Partly, the show was an evolution of Fulton's unmistakable pop sensibility: brightly optimistic, sixties-silhouetted, Deco-detailed, and just plain decorated. But today she rendered some of it with a lighter hand—not every look was stacked to the gills with accessories, as has been the case in the past. A boxy white top worn with lip-print silk pants may have come with a white fur bag, a hat, and earrings, but it still had a pajamalike ease. (For a bit of the designer's wit, check out the coat with disembodied lips sipping from the tower of the Empire State building.) Fulton going simple might sound antithetical to what's made her stand out, especially since her jewelry has resonated in such an immediate way. But it's good to see a young talent shifting and testing how best to bring her vision to the world each season.
20 February 2011
For Spring, Holly Fulton took her ultra-graphic, sixties-inflected pop glamour on the road—or, rather, the sea—imagining her ladies aboard a cruise ship, hitting various ports of call in the highest style imaginable. There are no half measures in the designer's vision of Art Deco and tribal motifs, either printed in bold black or rendered in a whole trimming shop's worth of embellishment. Here, palazzo pants (a cruise requirement) and a full skater-skirt silhouette—which stood out in a rain-slicker yellow laser-cut dress—joined the straight-cut shifts and jersey gowns Fulton is known for.The reference may have been a boat, but the giddily patterned and decorated look easily qualified as jet-set, finished as it was with iridescent aviators, far-from-shy Art Deco jewelry, and matching clutches or vanity cases. Actually, those finishing touches have garnered Fulton nearly as much attention as her clothes, and could be the path to real commercial viability. Then again, amid show ponies like the tiered skirt with a thick black fringe sandwiched between a cityscape pattern were workhorses like solid, plain jersey tanks and tees. But Fulton has more than mere wearability on her side: The power of such an energetic and unique vision is that everyone seems to be rooting for your success.
19 September 2010
With her bright, chic, optimistic geometries and jazzy, matching accessories, Holly Fulton is a distinctive new Scottish voice making a name for herself in London. Her first solo presentation (she came through Fashion East via the Royal College of Art) was a concise mini-affair of 23 looks, during which she reconfirmed her obsessions with Art Deco and sixties graphics—a combination of print, cutout plastics, and chunks of faceted Swarovski almost as big as the cat's-eye studs used in roads.Fulton upped her game this time by adding suede, fur, and snakeskin to the mix. It came off well in a sophisticated teal suede coat with black Toscana fur sleeves, as well as in a couple of fur clutches emblazoned with crystal fastenings. Altogether, it's an impressive start for a young designer who already has a British fashion award for jewelry design under her belt (she's been commissioned by Nadja Swarovski to design a collection for Atelier Swarovski). Fulton has only just relocated her studio from Edinburgh to London, and developing quietly at a geographic distance from the big city has stood her in good stead. The next few seasons will tell whether this highly organized, sensible designer will be able to turn her creative flair into commercially profitable lines. She'll need to start working with manufacturers who can finesse some of her product to higher specs, but as far as having a clear brand proposition is concerned, Holly Fulton already has it all lined up.
19 February 2010