Ports 1961’s Milan Vukmirovic set out to make a Spring collection about “peace and love, but not in a hippy way.” The amore theme is a continuation from recent seasons, and while his lineup certainly wasn’t crunchy (he avoided the “hippy” associations, even with artisanal necklaces and lots of embellishments), it often felt propped on a message that, while well-intentioned, didn’t quite gel.
There has been a lot of news lately about appropriation, and the degrees to which it is acceptable or permissible. Maybe every little message counts toward the greater, as-yet-to-be-reached good. But a T-shirt that read “Only Love Matters,” a broadening of the term “Black Lives Matter,” felt, to this writer, troublesome (a movement that big and important and personal to so many should perhaps not help to serve a company’s bottom line). Ditto for a clenched fist on a jumper that opened the show; there are subtler and more sensitive ways to deliver a message of resistance and fairness and acceptance.
And where Vukmirovic went subtler and more sensitive, there were some lovely pieces. An all-over beaded khaki trench was elegant and upbeat, as was a color-patched parka. There was a fantastic cobalt-blue belted coat in the mix, and some timely light-and-airy striped button-downs. Intricately thread-worked pants, styled with a simple navy tee, were also notable. If the focus stayed this course—in a kind of eclectically sleek, quietly layered channel—Vukmirovic’s communication would have been more convincing; love through colorful and crisp confidence. He did, though, vocally impart something we can all get behind: “Love is the unifying thing to fight for.”
