Fran Stringer’s research this season took her to Edinburgh, where she met and had lunch with one of her predecessors, a Pringle design director circa the 1960s by the name of Wallace Shaw. They talked paisley, which was popularized in Scotland, Pringle’s birthplace. There’s a paisley museum and large printed 19th-century wraps turned wall hangings inspired a group of printed cashmere knits in the label’s new collection.
Stringer arrived at Pringle from Mulberry about a year ago. Chalk it up to her being female—or not—but she’s got a healthy sense of what women want out of a knitwear company, including those printed cashmere sweaters in a gauge so fine they felt as light as T-shirts. Many of her ideas for Pre-Fall came out of the archives, but they didn’t feel weighted down by Pringle’s more than 200 years of history or otherwise contrived. The Fair Isle sweaters were boxy and oversize; by splicing two different patterns together, Stringer took the staid right out of the classic motif. Same goes for the argyle, a house signature, which she gave a slouched-on bias slant.
With knits what it ultimately comes down to, of course, is the touch of the fabric. We wear sweaters because they look good and feel good. Marled wool outerwear pieces were backed with a decidedly non-itchy jersey. But Stringer’s best idea just might’ve been the indigo cashmere jeans. One wear and it’d be hard to ever go back to raw selvedge denim.
