NYFW: The Shows FW2016 Day 1: Make Room for Emergence of Raul Penaranda; BCBGMAXAZRIA Is in Performer Mode; City Planning at Nicholas K; Healing Hurts at Ev Bessar

Designer Raul Penaranda and models wearing hisFW2016 collection. Photos by V.W.

Some of the players on Day 1: Nicholas K, BCBG, Hellessy, Erin Fetherston, Creatures of the Wind, Brock Collection, M. Martim, Pas de Calais, Brothers Vellies, Helen Yarmak, Desigual, Marissa Webb, Creatures of Comfort, A Moi, Avid Swim Resort, Raul Penaranda, Ulla Johnson, Assembly New York, Yuna Yang, Benzario Couture, Adam Selman, Area, Hanley

“I feel like a kid that just have a new toy and I am just opening the toy and I just don’t want the night to end. But I have to go home, take my dog for a walk, call my parents, and then be grateful for what just happened.”

Raul Penaranda is over the moon moments after delivering unto the world his FW2016 collection. His enthusiasm is not misplaced. The Columbian-born designer just has presented one will likely be one of the best shows of the FW2016 chapter of New York Fashion Week: The Shows at Gotham Hall as part of Style Fashion Week.

“I am inspired by emotion and the emotion is emerge,’ he says. When I say emerge it is because I feel that I am emerging, I in my own self to become a powerhouse in fashion. It not most about me, though, but about a woman that is emerging into her true self …and we show the world who she is through our clothes.

And this window to her soul reveals a woman who is poised, polished, confident. She has overcome some struggles, she has survived. She only follows a trend when it suits her.
Otherwise, she charts her own course, pushing out in waters as calm as the silk lame enseumbes, shimmering and winking. Giving comehither glances.

This iteration of the RP woman is turned out in a pair of brown brocade bell bottoms that would certainly be the envy of Pam Grier’s Foxy Brown.
In the common parlance, those bell bottoms are fierce … More shortly.

BCBGMAXAZRIA

A performer, an independent spirit. Taking her to the streets and to the stage.

NICHOLAS k

At "Arcosanti," experiments are in progress and we are dressed for any outcome.

EV BESSAR

Is it a bird? Is it a plane? It is "The Firebird." Is this the help we sought. Time will tell. Stay tuned.

Visit http://www.nyfw.com/ to learn more about New York Fashion Week: The Shows, including show information, videos and installations.

NYFW: The Shows Day 7 – Looking for Timeless, Well-Constructed Eye-Catching Clothes? Yes? ... Yes. Then,Try on Raul Penaranda and Chiara Boni La Petite Robe

From the Raul Penaranda S/S 2016 collections. Photos by Yours Truly.

Some of the players on Day 7: Suno, Raul Penaranda, Michael Kors, Delpozo, Paul Andrew, Parsons MFA, Naeem Khan, Boss, DKNY, The Adam Levine Collection Presented by Shop Your Way Brands/Kmart, Chiara Boni La Petite Robe, Theory, Cynthia Rowley, Greg Lauren, Proenza Schouler, The Blonds, Thomas Wylde, Stella Nolasco, Bibhu Mohapatra, J. Crew, Anna Sui, Demoo Parkchoonmoo

IT has been a difficult fashion week for various reasons around changes in venue, management and best practices.

Ask anybody who has been attending shows – whether covering, working backstage or examining goods for purchase. But I digress before I make my actual point.

Certainly, it has been a difficult fashion week. It has also been a good fashion week from a creative perspective. This observation is based on the shows I have seen. There are any number that fail to capture my interest or imagination because the collections are created more out of commercial expediency than any other factor.

Of course, all of these frocks bounding down runways, catwalks and standing around rooms are for sale. Fashion week is a tradeshow, after all, lest one forget in the maelstrom of activity around any celebrity-accented frontrow.

But must craft be sacrificed in the doing? Absotively not!

Two lines that strike a good balance between commerce and creativity (craft) are Raul Penaranda and Chiara Boni La Petite Robe. The talent behind both – F.I.T.-trained Raul Penaranda and self-taught Chiara Boni – launched in 2010 and 2007, respectively.

Though they have a different design aesthetic, they have a similar design ethic: Not trying to reinvent the wheel and not trying to please one and all. At the moment that is the highest compliment that can be bestowed on these artists, for one is at a loss for more words. It should be noted, though, that the designers like a bright, bold color for S/S 2016. Watch the videos; see the photos.

Two brands peddling the kind of product one hopes will abound during future New York Fashion Week: The Shows, or whatever moniker this affair deigns to affix to itself.

Raul Penaranda and Chiara Boni La Petite Robe know what they are about.

Chiara Boni La Petite Robe

From the Chiara Boni La Petite Robe S/S 2016 collections. Photos by Yours Truly.



From the Chiara Boni La Petite Robe S/S 2016 collections. Photos courtesy of Chiara Boni La Petite Robe.

On deck today, LAST DAY: CFDA (Fashion Incubator) S/S 2016 NYFW: Market, Ralph Lauren, J Mendel, Calvin Klein, Helen Yarmak, Marc Jacobs, Verge: Queer New York Fashion Week
Visit http://www.nyfw.com/ to learn more about New York Fashion Week: The Shows, including show information, videos and installations.

MBFW Last Day: Ending With a Strong Spanish Accent

HEAD’S UP: Continuing the approach we adopted commencing with the Fall 2012 edition of Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week New York, VEVLYN'S PEN will put emphasis on the truly inspirational on the runway, rather than a sort of “best of the lot, even if it’s not that good.” Why the change? Simply put, we have grown weary of watching far too many collections that lack imagination because too much attention has been paid to the bottomline. If nothing inspires, we will tell you so and tell you why. We still endeavor, however, to provide a roundup of the best, worst and most interesting Yours Truly (and others) witnesses, from trends to sightings to the rather unusual/bizarre.

Last Day
(SOME of the players at the tents and elsewhere):

WHILE the tents at Lincoln Center were closed yesterday (alas, the wrong world order it seems), the last day of Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week, there was action aplenty on runways around Manhattan.

From the Cesar Galindo Spring-Summer 2013 collection. Photo by Vivien Killilea/Getty Images.

Hewing to tradition, both Calvin Klein Collection and Ralph Lauren (see RL video above) showed at their respective ateliers. Joining them lately has been fellow vet Stephen Burrows. Also on deck on the last, a passel of up-and-comers like Alisha Trimble, along with a string of talent with Spanish and Spanish-sounding surnames: Victor de Souza, Ricardo Seco, Raul Penaranda, Jorge Vega Umana.

While the day did not end with a bang, it had some fireworks, particularly in the form of RL’s Spanish dalliance, Cesar Galindo’s engaging meditation in b&w with colorful departures, as well as Brood’s homage floral … More shortly.

Visit http://www.mbfashionweek.com to learn more about Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week, including show information and videos.