Yesterday we got to check out a whole boatload of fresh fall Raf Simons and Helmut Lang. However commercial, it kind of put us in a darker mood. You know, dark for us--we typically gravitate towards the nerdy stuff. We're going to cover London Fashion Week this year and though we always report on the shows remotely, we feel a refresher course is in store. So we went on one of those endless fashion tangents that starts with Helmut Lang and ends with something much more avant garde--we had on our minds the London coverage and the clothing from yesterday. We ended with Gareth Pugh. We ended with the picture you see at left and realized that it's amazing and scary and we really like him. So, a few things you might like to know about the designer. He's British (obviously), he's 25 or so, he's most likely more broke than most designers (who are mostly broke) because none of his fashions were for sale until his Spring 07 collection, he's stocked at Dover Street Market, and Anna Wintour (and therefore Style.com and, er, everyone else) approves. That picture is the stuff of nightmares and we can only hope for more of this come September. Sorry there are no spreads to offer, that cape isn't exactly Shopbop-friendly.

You could always forego the trip to Spain, buy this frock, and hop a jet to Mexico City. The Mint Jodi Arnold Side Button Dress has us thinking of immediate departures. A strong color for summer, particularly cobalt, will surely make the season (as limited as it is) seem more fashionable. We saw this color in the Richard Chai and Helmut Lang shows for spring, and, many a Fall 07 collection sampled the hue. Stop blow drying your hair, use olive oil as moisturizer, sweep the most basic rouge across your cheeks (while wearing this dress, of course) and you've got sexy down pat. Screw Bridal Week, go find yourself a single caballero.


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Designer Richard Chai's collection was one of our favorites from the Spring shows. Now that deliveries are being made, and the season is upon us, we thought to recap the collection that wooed us back in September. Chai, who worked under Marc Jacobs and label Tse (he turned Tse right around), launched his own collection back in 2004. He is known for his intricate details and special fabric choices. This Spring 08 Chai showed the kind of sporty silks that we love from designers like Calvin Klein, or on the more avant garde side of things, Helmut Lang. It is a wearable collection that would flatter women of all ages, potentially explaining why this year's collections were picked up by Bergdorf and the like. Our favorite aspect of the collection were the trousers. Right on point with this relaxed mid-section thing that's been sweeping through fashion, the trousers were mostly high-waisted, moved like water, and had a fold-over waistband that pulled in the look (reminding us the wearer has a waistline). Check out our video and gallery of the Spring 08 collection as well as links to Fall, below.

As the first fashion week collection since Helmut Lang left the brand, Spring 08 followed his genius full suit. The designers for Helmut Lang, Michael and Nicole Colovos, had quite a bit of responsibility resting on their shoulders. If you remember, Lang left the brand in 2005 inspiring Prada to sell them off to Link Theory Holdings (who owns Theory, Rosner, and PLS+T; three mass market brands with a significantly lower price point), shortly thereafter. The brand, in transition, was then absent through three seasons, kept Spring and Fall 07 rather quiet, and remerged for Spring 08 during Fashion Week. The designers, Michael and Nicole Colovos, founded Habitual jeans before taking lead with the quickly changing brand, and the general consensus is that they've done right with their first collection out of the official gates. The collection showed off the signature Helmut Lang palate of blacks and whites, as well as the expected tailored separates, and modern-bondage twists and turns. Although Helmut Lang may have lost it's young New York fallowing (these minds have such little devotion anyway) we predict, at least in New York, they'll garner support from Rad Hourani/Modernist scene, taking those young, avant garde professionals by storm once again.

Aspiration, desire, and luxury mingle freely with hunger, pain and death. Fashion's treatment of the body is one of compulsion and envy even as it offers tantalizing freedom to the individual. But for the time being we are feeling constricted by the contradiction.