There's a fine line between procrastination and work. When director Ken Russell died a little over two years ago, Giles Deacon was inspired to re-watch his films, such as his landmark adaptation of the D.H. Lawrence novel Women in Love. At the time, this may have seemed so much distraction, but this season, Deacon's immersion in the Russell oeuvre bore tasty fruit. As he explained of this Giles collection, it was inspired by a certain kind of young woman who reappeared in Russell's work: a posh girl, rather uptight, but "blossoming and burgeoning," in Deacon's words. He was imagining that girl traveling to London to meet a filmmaker like Russell, and getting swept up in the mod scene and the director's own escalating provocations.
Anyway, Deacon likes a backstory. This one gave him a strong peg on which to hang his interest in decadence—of the operatic, historical kind on the one hand and the pop-tastic, nightclub-y kind on the other. Op art polka dots and baroque wallpaper jacquards had a meeting of the minds here. Likewise, Deacon did a fine job yoking together his sense of nattiness, evidenced in the discipline of these retro-ish silhouettes, and his anarchic streak, which found an outlet in a chaotic bright pink print and in luxe jacquards in a pattern of chain link. A pale pink chain-link jacquard suit was a particular winner; it captured the appeal of this collection overall—very neat and very twisted.
