Wednesday, 19 June 2013

Trends in Summer Dresses 2012


Summer is traditionally the most expressive and experimental season for most designers, and the summer dress is one wardrobe staple that is reinvented on an annual basis.  This year’s designs have continued this spirit of innovation, sending vibrant bursts of colour cascading onto the catwalk and the high street.

While last year was all about billows of virginal white cotton, this year’s dresses have thrown away 2011’s colour conventions and made a return to more traditional values. The light curtains of flowing white fabric are gone, and they have replaced with busy, impressionist palettes of colour. This is most notable in the Dolce and Gabanna, Emilo Pucci and Cavalli collections. Their dresses confound the eye with dancing patterns, like a Gustav Klimt painting.

The best example of these dresses comes from the Roberto Cavalli collection.  He is well known for his intricate and complex prints, but his dresses were even more exuberant than usual this year. His 2012 collection walks an elegant line between subtle and garish, and is the natural successor to the styles we saw in his winter offering. The rise of the loud patterned summer dress this is proof that Cavalli’s influence penetrates deep into the heart of fashion, but he has innovated yet again, confounding his competitors while perfecting the style many of them seem determined to emulate.

Last year’s trends aren’t completely behind us.  We still see plenty of light flowing fabrics, but cotton has been almost completely consigned to the bargain rack. We’re more likely to see dresses in sheer fabrics like organza and taffeta with long flows of feminine and intricate layers, rather than opaque, shapeless cotton hoops.

The Etro collection is perhaps this year’s best example of evolution rather than revolution. Long, straight white dresses have been augmented with bright flashes of auburn, or patches of pastel blue print. The necklines are nothing short of intriguing, with unusual shapes that seem inspired by last year’s winter collections.

As well as bright, Klimptesque patterns, we’ve also seen a lot of lace this year. Elie Saab, Valentino, and Oscar de la Renta all devoted significant space in their collections to lace dresses, mostly in cream colours but also with the occasional splash of crimson. Preen also used lace extensively, but in a more modern, unexpected and characteristically groundbreaking way.

Of course, this is fashion, and not every designer follows the prevailing mood. We’ve also seen examples of more diverse styles. The dresses in the Dask collection were particularly unique this year, using thick stripes arranged in geometric shapes reminiscent of semaphore flags. This style is particularly prevalent because of how comprehensively it was copied by high street brands. H&M, Topshop and Zara all sold thousands of similar dresses this year.

It has been an interesting year for this type of garment, and we will be watching anxiously to see what effect these trends have on next year’s spring/summer collections. Our prediction is that we are likely to see a return to classic cuts and neutral shades, but only time will tell.