Right off the bat, this collection was all about legs, legs, legs, legs, legs. High heels, long legs striding down the street. At the time people were shocked and could not believe that I was going to show a fall collection with bare legs. I was the first one [to do that]. Everyone said, ‘No, no. You wear black tights in the winter.’ And I said, ‘No.’
We started realizing that people were traveling more; they were in Los Angeles, they were in warmer cities. We were not suggesting people take a stroll in Chicago in February with bare legs, although later they did. [This show] became the precursor.
[There’s] a lot of shine in that show, and suddenly a suit became a little trimmer, neater. It wasn’t the power suit, the shoulders were gone. [That was another] thing we were starting to see really percolate more the ’90s.
I’ve always played with animal motifs; this was really the first show where I thought, You know what? We’re really going to have fun with it doing it head-to-toe. I think it happened because, again trying to balance things, I felt the abbreviated length allowed you to have this more demonstrative pattern, so that you didn’t overwhelm yourself. Your skin sort of became the accessory for the pattern.
