OSMAN SPRING 2011

Osman Yousefzada sharpened his signature knack for giving straightforward-looking clothes a layer of interest and sexual tension by, say, slicing open the back of a shell top, or crafting the silhouette of an elegant dress so it seemed like one panel of it had shifted tectonically and ended up slightly longer than the rest. A more overt expression of the designer's approach was the half-skirt swag of material that he tacked onto the hip. It made for mixed results. What stood out here: the simplest pieces, like a black cotton dress with belled sleeves, a half peplum, and a sliver of inset mesh, or a white dolman-sleeved dress with box pleats that was freshness incarnate. What could have been jettisoned: the neon-ish hues. "Yes, a collection this clean and sober needs a pop of something to break it up, but these crazy colors didn't feel like the right answer."

 

Jx