Clear the decks. The Collections show at Portland Fashion Week tonight. This is a group of designers at whose core is a group who were among the first to sell at Portland’s seminal boutique showcase for independent designers, Seaplane. as we’ve said before, Designers, organizers, impresarios have come and gone, but one boutique has been ground-zero for cutting-edge independent designers in Portland since the turn of the millennium: Seaplane. They’ve provided community, support, catalyst, and retail exposure for countless Portland designers. Since then, the group has expanded to include other designers with a similar non-mainstream sensibility and other likeminded designers who, in the push and pull between art and commerce, are likely to have one or both feet planted on the side of art and/or conceptualism on any given day. There are those new to The Collections like Daniel McCall, and others who will be missed, like Adam Arnold.
photo: Bryan Myss
A Broken Spoke — John Blasioli, who apprenticed with Adam Arnold and who costumes The Decemberists, creates the men’s line A Broken Spoke, giving men the same kinds of quietly statement-making clothes that Portland’s women are so lucky to have available to us. His details are wonderful, his signature tab across the placket, cutting fabric on the diagonal or piecing sportshirts.
Dayna Pinkham is a city treasure, an amazing milliner who eschews fussy, “hatty” hats for the kind of smart modern hats (impeccably crafted) that have been a step ahead of NY designers interest in same. We saw a sneak preview of her men’s hats on the runway with Duchess suits the other night. See this review of her 2006 show on the Portland Streetcar.
Elizabeth Dye designs and produces her eponymous collection, co-owns one of Portland’s best shops, The English Dept, with Joy Cohen, and was a pioneering fashion writer in Portland. Among the most consistently strong designers, Dye bends historical references to her own modern, feminine will, with a focus on fabric and shape.
Emily Ryan pioneered rigorously executed experimental clothes that are thrilling to see, a bodice in a basketweave of fabric strips, or swirling spirals of pleated ruffles cascading down a floorlength gown. She has also been ahead of the game, doing bubble hem dresses and rompers well before that wave hit the mainstream beach.
Genevieve Dellinger is one of a handful of Portland’s more adventurous designers, a girl with a Martin Margiela bent and a streetwear flavor who also makes the kinds of simple modern pieces that modern girls snap up. She co-owns the Eastside’s Denwave with Hazel Cox.
Holly Stalder co-owns with Kate Towers the motherlode and/or mothership of Portland independent fashion, Seaplane, where many of these designers showed and sold their first forays into fashion. Stalder loves precious fabrics and embraces the quietly decorative, with feminine ruffles, vintage lace and pearl applique to make very special, often one-of-a-kind dress.
Kate Towers deconstructed feminine looks have over the years morphed into more polished looks in fine silks and wools, most recently with killer little jumpers, and ruffled high neck blouses, little rows of ruffles and jabots.
Linea. photo: Jaycob Desrosiers
Jess Beebe’s line Linea, has an easy cool-girl vibe. She experiments with innovative construction as well as understated details. As we’ve said in reviewing previous collections, this is the pleasure to be found in Linea– details like four small pleats that give a skirt the right amount of swing, or tiny darts that shape the bodice just so in fabrics like silk, linen and fine cotton. The quality of the construction and the nuances of Beebe’s designs are the equivalent of a Linea look catching your attention by whispering to you rather than hitting you over the head with its cleverness.
Liza Rietz spoke on Friday at a panel discussion about taking her eponymous collection away from commerce (she’s recently stopped doing wholesale orders) and back toward art, opening her own shop with Blasioli where a client can come in, choose from one of the samples and have them custom made. Rietz is an artful experimentalist who won’t shy away from a dramatic shape (a fishtail kneelength skirt) or flourish (fit and flare gauchos), but who, at the end of the day, makes clothes with extraordinary details that are very wearable.
Daniel McCall, new to The Collections has a long history with designing but has only in the last few years visibly reentered the fray in earnest. We have been wowed by the hommage pieces he has done we described this way: wool jersey dresses after Kleibacker and Vionnet, a muslin take on a ’50s Dior ribboned skirt (incredible!), and a Comme des Garcons-esque t-shirt with “smocking for the new millennium.” He’s an incredible artist, a fact made very evident in the Dior skirt and an incredible silk kimono coat with pieced sleeves in varying earth shades. His work is meant to be inspected up close, to appreciate for its detailed construction.
See also this 2006 Collections preview on ultra.
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