Topshop Unique – Pre Spring Summer 2016 Ready-To-Wear
Unique started life as a runway figurehead for Topshop’s awesome commercial juggernaut. That it now represents at Pre-Fall and Resort (this is Unique’s first full Resort collection, while Pre-Fall, which just dropped, is proving too wanted to service its thousands-strong waiting list) suggests it has proven handier than a mere calling card.
Unique’s muse was on a bar crawl in Soho (London’s, not New York’s), after whose streets each piece is named. The crushed pink and black velvet suits were louche-dandyish, carrying a diluted touch of the Sebastian Horsleys (but far less unwholesome). The leopard-print, shaggy-patch shearling; cowl-neck leather minidress; and lamé side-split, slash-back bias dress had a certain 1980s walker’s courtliness to them (but far, far, far less unwholesome). Such qualifications were not always called for: The cashmere-merino ottoman-stitch Bretons with complementary pashminas had, as designer Geoffrey Finch suggested, relevance for the adventuresome lady writers who once nursed half-pints at The French House and fell at the feet of Jeffrey Bernard. The chunky-buckle belted navy and khaki trench jumpsuits weren’t especially evocative of anything. Although the retail price—225 pounds—might well evoke a powerful need to acquire them.