Alice McCall

 

This is the last review from Hannah and I's fashion week coverage. I hope you enjoyed!
Check out our other reviews of Romance Was Born, Gary Bigeni, Gail Sorronda, Zimmermann, Michael Lo Sordo and Magdalena Velevska.

It could have been that bright and cheery tangerine orange, the perfect off-set to Marilyn Monroe curls and baby-blue leather head-kerchiefs. It could have been the pretty-as-a-picture laser-cut leather and folkloric bright florals. Or maybe it was those jingle jangle drop earrings that swung from the models ears and winked as they walked. Backstage, while the models shrugged their slip-of-a-thing shoulders into sheer-overlay mini dresses and cutesy periwinkle brocade playsuits something odd was going on. They were smiling. Grabbing each other by the hand and swapping war stories from the week with barely disguised glee, or chowing down on bowls of fruit salad and yoghurt laid out along a tressle table like christmas presents, we couldn't quite believe what we saw. Everything was so pretty. Everything was so lovely. Everyone - from the wide-eyed models to the puffer-jacket pr girl and the prada- clad stylist - was so, so happy.

It's an Alice McCall thing. Sunny, easy-breezy, thoroughly happy clothes for girls who don't want to spend too much time thinking about what to wear. Not when there are more important things in life like picnics, or afternoon tea dates, or dancing the night away. And that's what you would be doing in next season Alice McCall, with a million frocks that couldn't be more perfect for girls who waste away hours reading Stella Gibbons and thinking about boys. Sweetheart necklines, peplums, paper-bag waist shorts... Add the rosy blush that adorned the models' cheeks - the colour of a girl in love - and you'd be poised to wile away an hour or two.

There is something to be said for designers who indulge their inner sweet-tooth every now and then. We know it happens - who will ever forget the saccharine revolution of S/S 2012 - but we always seem so damn surprised when designers choose to parade about unashamedly, unabashedly fun clothes instead of the serious, directional stuff that we expect them to do. But for everything there is a season. And Alice McCall's season is right now. Her designs have never been as flirty and flippant as they have been now - and we need it in our current fashion climate more than ever. There is a very real danger of taking fashion too seriously. McCall's ode to frippery - and lest you be concerned that all this prettiness will subvert traditional feminine wiles, there was a potent undercurrent of can't-look-away lolita-ness to it all, never fear, never fear - was as poetically poignant as any paean to minimalism we've ever seen. Girls really do just want to have fun.

Photos and words by Hannah-Rose Yee, editing and illustration by me.