’Tis the season of magical thinking. The giveaway in Karen Walker’s latest collection was the prevalence of unicorns—embroidered ones and those cavorting in fields on wallpaper prints. The unicorns were a witty replacement for the horses you might have expected to see in this country-and-western–inflected outing; given the hint of disco here as well, you might say that Walker was imagining what the rodeo looks like after a few pills. Thumbs-up to that concept.
This collection was heavy on the frills. Virtually all of Walker’s tops and dresses were ruffled one way or another, with the effects ranging from the heavy-duty froth of her off-the-shoulder dresses and tops to the flirtatious touch of ruffle on a metallic leather jacket or otherwise austere black silk frock. The sugariness of all those ruffles was counterbalanced by the lineup’s homespun elements—its sharply cut, deep-blue denim; ochre-toned chinos; and generous helpings of gingham and plaid. Even the winsome unicorn print got a bit of humility when rendered in heavy-duty muslin.
This was one of those Karen Walker collections where you marvel at her ability to make the ludicrous seem, well, mundane. To coin a trendy phrase, she’s very good at normalizing her flashes of madness and far-flung references, distilling them into a sartorial language every young woman can speak. In a world that currently seems a bit mad on the whole, Walker’s clothes make perfect sense.
