The Calm Before the Storm

After a designer's splashy runway show, I usually look back at their pre-collection as the calmer more retail friendly predecessor.

And maybe because Resort collections have been established long before the pre-fall market, I find them chalk full of ideas and silhouettes a designer pushes further in a Spring/Summer collection.

This Resort season I was especially tickled by Giambattista Valli's collection.

Valli's crisp whites and refined florals are reminiscent of quite possibly my favorite fashion ad campaign of the 90s.    

The 1995 Spring/Summer Gucci ad campaign.

One year into his appointment as Creative Director, Tom Ford bought in Carine Roitfeld and Mario Testino to bring to life his vision of the new house of Gucci.  

Luxurious scarves and frame bags mixed with skin and sensuality helped introduce the new house to the old establishment.  

It was subtle.  It was a sigh, it was an oooo, an ahhhh.

And what followed the 1995 Spring/Summer collection came out of nowhere.  

The Fall Collection hit our senses hard.

Ford's iconic runway assault of lush velvets, low-rise stove-pipe pants, unbuttoned power blouses, and electric color which single-handily reintroduced glamour back to the 90s.

At the end we couldn't catch our breath.  We were drowning.  

We see the signs when we look back at that year, and we should have seen it coming.

Valli's Haute Couture collection is next.  Will the breath of fresh air of the Resort collection prove to be the calm before the storm.  We can only wait and see.