This might be David Koma's first Resort collection, but, whoa, this 29-year-old has been designing collections since he was 13 (albeit with a brief sabbatical, aged 15, to focus on schoolwork). Like Jason Wu, Yves Saint Laurent, or those few other precociously self-knowing fashion designers whose vocation hit them so early—and who possess talent enough to fuel its flowering—Koma has mastered his own language when others are still wrestling with basics. An understanding of anatomy and a fixation on the physical architecture of the feminine gives him the tools to hone subtly (and sometimes unsubtly) hot fabric parentheses for his women.
Here, in a literal interpretation of Resort, he took some of the tropes of swimwear and applied them to evening. He should do real swimwear, especially if it can incorporate some of the calligraphic dash and flash of the neckline in Look 13. The degrade-shaded mirrored beading and Swarovski—meant to mimic pool tiling—felt heavier than a set of barre class weights, but defied gravity to somehow lay flush on the fabric. Elsewhere, the double ruffles that cavorted across necklines led the eye to the triceps, while the silver-snagged drawstrings that ran down jumpsuit legs or curled across the body were an athletically enhanced vehicle for display. Disciplined clothes for disciplined bodies from a disciplined mind.
