WYNN HAMLYN – ‘Seasons’ AW18
New Zealand Fashion Week 2017
He’s billed as ‘a standout talent of New Zealand’s new generation of contemporary designers.’ This was just his second solo New Zealand Fashion Week show and his first in the big 400-seater venue – we’ll let the post-show press release explain Wynn Crawshaw’s bold and fresh concept first:
“Wynn Hamlyn’s ‘Seasons’ looks at the bizarre way seasons are structured in the fashion industry. As a young designer, Wynn was amazed at how summer collections deliver into store in August (mid-winter in New Zealand) and winter collections deliver into store in February (mid-Summer).”
“The collection then looks deeper into the fact that due to climate change, adverse, off-season weather and storm events happen all year round. Hence, you may need your winter coats in February and your summer dresses in August.”
We had been tipped off to this ‘two-seasons-at-once’ theme by the beautiful Kelly Thompson-designed carpet at the entry to the New Zealand Fashion Week, one of a series that also adorned the runway at the show itself – showing a flowering vine that is in places flourishing and healthy, but in others wilting and dying.
That same print appeared on the show’s first outfit. Presented vertically on a sleeveless dress, it made for an exquisite, trailing black and white (and later black/pale blue) floral, the vertical lines underscored by wide black binding. That segued nicely into the black around the crown of the Hamlyn-designed ‘Handmaid’s Tail’-esque visors made by Australian milliner Helen Kaminski.
A trench in classic tan followed, the first of many tailored pieces alike in their unfussiness, with that minimalism echoed by the show’s flat mules. ‘Fluid versus structured’ played throughout the show’s styling.
Then the first of the collection’s signature corsets appeared, all shown decisively as outerwear layered over other garments, in quilting, raffia, plain and ribbed.
In combining two seasons in one collection Hamlyn offered garments in a wide range of fabrics: shirting, pinstripe suiting, velvet, what looked like leather, denim. But the knits stole the texture show: in lacquer red, they ranged from the perfect ribbed sweater, shown tucked into jeans, to slinky dresses with the range’s corsets layered over top.
Our advice: make a couple of Wynn Hamlyn pieces your own next season. You’ll be able to say you were one of the first! Then look forward to following this important local talent on his fascinating fashion design journey.
By Julie Roulston
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Photography by Annupam