Fashion

Erdem - London Spring/Summer 2010

‘I’m reconsidering the idea of luxury and thinking of it based on individualism’, says Erdem Moralioglu, who has looked to Japan for ideas this season. Not the Japan of tradition but Tokyo in the 1920s and the ‘Modan gaaru’, rebellious and individual young women influenced by Paris fashion and American movies. ‘The Modan gaarus used traditional ideas and turned them on their heads, and S/S10 is about taking something and displacing it. Kimonos are westernized, crystals beads applied to a cotton lace cocktail dress; density contrasts with lightness and the CRYSTALLIZED™ – Swarovski Elements are integral to this. In his seventh season of collaboration with Swarovski, Erdem applies his crystals like an artist who uses paint with an instinctively light touch: he is an assured colourist. Opaque alabasters sit with vibrant vermilions, black jet has been introduced for the first time for summer to provide a foil to the bright colours; air blue opal Briolettes and fabulous Xilion light blue opal beads, mint alabaster with rosewater opals, fuchsia and purple velvet crystals. Delicate, these touches of crystal may be, they were an important part of a watershed Erdem moment.