Sonia Rykiel remains the eternal muse at the house that bears her name, but she doesn’t have to be the only strong, independent-woman source of inspiration. For fall, Julie de Libran fell under the spell of artist Niki de Saint Phalle, her work referenced in the shiny silver heart sculpture that served as a runway porthole and the large colorful lanterns strung from the ceiling of the Beaux-Arts. Additionally, “I realized she was born the same year as Sonia Rykiel,” said de Libran backstage. “I love how these women used creativity as a platform to express their messages.”
They also shared a passion for color, which de Libran celebrated, using it creatively and craftily via feathers and floral embroideries done with raw stitches to punctuate the lineup. She referred to clothes as canvases, working with classics based on house DNA — gypsy dresses, knits, suits, trenches and stripes — mostly in black, white and navy and building them up in proportion and embellishment.
The show opened with a belted white dress in what looked like sturdy linen with exaggerated sleeves and curving vertical ruffles, romantic but clean in its construction. The same could be said for gypsy dresses in navy and khaki with high necklines, blouson sleeves and tassels and red and navy trim: They had a nice balance of exuberance and sobriety. Signature tweeds were rendered in thick patchworks, such as on the skirt worn with a red cable knit sweater that fell into a graceful peplum. The colorful threads from the tweeds were reprised as crafty floral embroidery on a black satin peasant dress. De Libran layered robust shearlings over delicate white floral prints, and inventively worked a broderie anglaise motif as a blown-up white pattern on a lean black knit dress. Toward the end of the show, she trimmed wispy georgette dresses in black and olive-green in colorful tribal feathers around the neckline and glamorous tonal plumes on the skirts.
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The clothes moved freely, vibrating with color and a bohemian spirit in a very adult, un-silly way. Rykiel and de Saint Phalle’s weren’t the vigorous female voices in the collection. De Libran’s was there, too: Loud and clear.