Having explored Persia for several seasons, Christian Wijnants “decided to board a train to Japan,” as he quipped during a showroom interview. It’s not as farfetched as it sounds. The Belgian designer approaches his clothes as a vector for his emotions and moods, and while he has traveled to Japan recently, he didn’t want to go literal. Instead, he spent days browsing through textile museums letting his interest in fabrics and color be his guide. “I love the way the Japanese mix colors together,” he said. “You see very warm earthy colors that nonetheless have kind of an icy overtone.”
The designer brought home lots of ideas for prints and more accessories—anise green gloves, for example—and used them to give his Pre-Spring collection extra dimension, with a boy-meets-girl vibe thrown in for good measure. Prints and knitwear are the core of Wijnants’s brand, and this is the season of animal prints, with leopard rendered tiny on a shiny slicker, blown up in blue and green on a short-sleeved trench or a high-neck dress, and so large on one blouse that the motif actually looked more flora than fauna. Ambiguity is the point.
He also knew when to tone things down, offering, for example, ample, shirred cotton tops and dresses in white or blush tones, trouser-cut soft denim, and easy staples in laminated leather, such as in peacock blue trousers or a chocolate trench, which he said are designed to take on extra personality and suppleness with wear.
