A few days before his show, Narciso Rodriguez said that he had taken inspiration from the work of legendary designer Cristobal Balenciaga, who combined masterful tailoring with simple but elegant designs. And in the superb collection he showed tonight, Rodriguez demonstrated his ability to bring those elements to a modern wardrobe.
Rodriguez kept the silhouette long and lean, contouring dresses and shirts to the body with clinging inset bodices and introducing an elongated tunic top. A minimalist by nature, his palette was white, black, cream, gray and gold, although there were—how shocking!—two blush-pink dresses. Boxy jackets with slightly rounded shoulders hung just to the waist of slightly flared, tailored trousers or knee-length pencil skirts; silky, fluid blouses wrapped loosely in front. Even Rodriguez's fur was restrained: He showed inky sheared mink pieces—a short jacket, a tunic, a narrow coat—that looked at first glance like particularly plush velvet.
For evening Rodriguez raised the glamour quotient a hair by simply adding a whiff of beading to a satin shirt, or offering a heavy gold pencil skirt. And as if that weren't enough, he sent out a group of satin glamour dresses, each with its own version of a ruffle at the back. Restrained, refreshing and quite beautiful.
