Half of Jonathan Saunders' aesthetic veers towards electro music and hard-edged va-va-voom eighties graphics; the other half prefers fluttery, dotty prettiness. Thus, his audience was jolted around in an East End studio, trying to figure what his spring collection was about. Dresses is the quick answer—but the provenance of the color and print takes a bit more explaining.
Obligingly, Saunders listed the art-based influences that went into his long basket-woven chiffons, floor-length columns, and short, body-conscious dresses. His program notes paid homage to David Hockney, Anthony Caro, and Irving Penn—imagery that, put through the blender of Saunders' imagination, ended up as a palette of saturated blue, ochre, orange, gray, and black. Some of the pieces, like an artily polka-dotted short-waist dress with a full skirt would work well on a young starlet. Others were clunkers, but that's life.
