The Natural Blonde
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‘This season we wanted to explore the idea of Paula Yates’ feminine sexuality,’ wrote Sister by Sibling, aka Joe Bates, Sid Bryan and Cozette McCreery, the design trio who has taken knitwear by the scruff of the neck and shaken it, championed it, subverted it, and pushed it front and centre stage – on to the back of Cara Delevingne, no less - at London Fashion Week.
You can practically feel their sense of relish in taking the mumsy craft of knitwear and transporting it – via a potent storyline of our bleach-blonde, tragic heroine - into catwalk-headlining, retail-worthy stuff.
They said they had been inspired by their muse’s ‘perfect housewife’ look – the way Paula Yates favoured 1940s and 1950s silhouettes but how, in reality, she was the Punk version of an English rose.
The translation of this was huge bouncing mountains of wool, as jumper dresses, coats, hats, even on the frill of a skirt. Followed by vibrant Fair Isles, then polite, chintzy twinsets covered in roses and finally leopard jacquards in slinky dresses with cape backs and bat wings.
It was great, fun, spirited and technically brilliant. And it left you wanting more: more actual clothes (there were only 20 exits) and more madness. This is a team whose business thrives off their unique approach to one sole material - a feat in itself – but then why don’t Sid, Joe and Cozette (whose names even sound like characters out of a Punk movie) really go for it? Really push knit beyond the boundaries, to the absolute limit? That’s what we want to see. Rip it up, Sister.
