Christopher Kane Autumn Winter 2011 #LFW

You might have seen tweets from myself or Ann from Girl in the City this past week about our imminent trip to London Fashion Week ...

We ventured down to the 'Big Smoke' specifically for the Christopher Kane show.  Having just won the British Fashion Council/Vogue award and Elle's Best Designer award my fellow Scot is really riding high on a wave of success.  It was such an honour to have the opportunity to attend such a show never mind find that we were seated with his friends and family ...awww!

Smug ;) 

 After a buzz of excitement over spotting the likes of Alexa Chung, Anna Wintour, Daphne Guinness and Hilary Alexander we suddenly remembered we were there to view Kane's Autumn Winter collection and pulled ourselves together. Waiting for the collection to make it's way down the runway,  colour and embellishment was what I had in mind given past collections of neon and lace.

I photographed our place names! excited, much?!

I was surprised to find a muted and minimal collection in appearance but fascinating and intriguing in it's detail.  Bestowed before our zealous and fashion hungry eyes were grandma crochet and printed leather in hues of black and navy before a zingier arrangement of sequins and cashmere dresses embellished with plastic pouch material filled with squishy coloured fluid.

As soon as I spotted these little plastic adornments which decorated pocket detail as well as bodices and necklines I immediately thought of my old school pencil case.  I was thrilled then to find out Christopher's inspiration had indeed been his very own school pencil case.  Boy has good taste!

Printed leather and crochet. Black with 'pencil case' detailing

Known as the liquid collection and set to a backdrop of fluid inspired sound effects Kane gave insight to his vision "It was inspired by the pencil cases I had at school and lollipops. But we didn’t want it to be over elaborate – we wanted it to be about really wearable, sophisticated clothes." 


Models make up was minimal and hair was slicked back in low pony tails by Paul Hanlon and the TIGI creative team to create a modern, sleek look inspired by the collection itself. 


See my quick video snippet on the runway ...



So watch out kids, printed leather and fluid filled bags are hopefully going to pop up on the high street in a nod to Christopher Kane's genius.  I will be after both ... especially a squishy clutch please :)


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