From my bench on the 28th floor, I could see the Baroque pomp of St. Paul’s; the hard brutalism of the Barbican; and the whatever-it’s-called, computer-generated fluid ergonomics of all the new skyscrapers erected in London’s financial center recently. Backstage, Rejina Pyo said the decision to overlook this traditionally masculine precinct of work was conscious. Over the opening Kronos track, an American-accented male voice matter-of-factly narrated the prejudices women face in the workplace (even though such inequality is unlawful).
“The collection considers this historic idea of men and women in the workplace, and what they’re expected to look like, so it’s kind of ironic to be above this cityscape,” said Pyo. That the show’s most senior and well-remunerated participants and observers were overwhelmingly women—with men a minority chiefly relegated to functionary roles and the photo pit—was a little ironic too, but then fashion is an exceptional bubble. Pyo’s notes also finely quoted Dostoyevsky—another bloody man: “One can live magnificently in this world if one knows how to work and how to love.” Pyo added that the internal conflict she felt when returning to work after giving birth last October had sharpened her focus on the often opposing currents women must navigate between the domestic and the income-generating arenas.
So what was today’s wearable solution? In truth the collection had none: Instead, the questions were contextual mood music, which served to unite Pyo’s constituency. There was tailoring, of course, handsome especially in the opening one-and-a-half-breasted jacket. The notion of providing women with the garments to present themselves on their own terms and according to their own self-directed gaze was expressed via opaquely sheer-colored dresses, skirts, and tops that were held against the body with pearlescent fastenings. The closing knitted dress, knitted headpieces, and knitted bras worn outside other garments were a reflection on both domestic labor and an evasion of the male gaze. There was a pale blue halter-neck dress, straightforward and strong, whose halters were looped through a golden bangle at the clavicle. A trucker jacket and trench in brown vegan leather were the stars of a suite of pieces fashioned from the material.
Ultimately, this collection’s presentation and pitch felt reductively in thrall to a polarizing, dogmatic position on gender that was not nearly as nuanced and interesting as the clothes themselves.
