Sonia by Sonia Rykiel – Pre Spring/Summer 2016 Ready-To-Wear

The premise of the Parisian is ripe with the potential to wear thin. But it’s an archetype that the Sonia Rykiel brand comes by more honestly than almost any other around, emblematic as it has been of Left Bank insouciance for decades. As a result, both the main line and little sister brand Sonia by Sonia Rykiel continue to unpack this identity in compelling ways, particularly since the appointment of Julie de Libran at the former.

For Resort, the Sonia By team imagined their perennial bourgeois muse traipsing through the arrondissements in ’70s silhouettes and gleefully mismatched prints. They got a lot of mileage out of a tiger stripe, particularly nice as it came to life as trim on a classic gabardine trench. Other quietly subversive classics included a simple minidress bearing a trompe l’oeil bra in dentelle or a fringed tweed take on la marinière. Less staple—but no less fun—styles included a gleaming silver leather jacket and skirt decked out in an oversize floral motif.

If Sonia By’s role as a secondary line has meant that designs have skewed to the girlish, Resort saw a shift toward an even more coquettish avatar. Inspiration from architect Carlo Mollino’s evocative soft-core Polaroids (which came to light only after his death, and were recently the subject of a splashy exhibit courtesy of Gagosian) yielded micro shorts; sweaters worn unbuttoned along the sides for a hint of skin; glossy minis; and a beautiful, Birkin-esque frock with floppy, knuckle-skimming cuffs. Vive la Parisienne.