No one appreciates a good juxtaposition more than Nicole Miller. The designer, who frequently takes disparate elements and distills them into a collection theme, found herself looking to the flatlands of contemporary Arizona and the swinging music scene of Europe in the 1960s. Her muses Patti Boyd and Françoise Hardy may never have set foot in Phoenix, but that’s of little concern; Miller’s seasonal hot take made for a compelling what if.
The idea of Hardy and her ilk roaming through the Biltmore Hotel was a punchy visual. Model Heidi Mount carried the concept into reality, lending a worldliness to pieces that could have skewed youthful. Sure, a Gen-Z beauty could easily pull off the mod minidress with a zippered slit, but so could her sister or aunt. Miller broadened her reach here, appealing to a crowd sure to get her references and to young people for whom the idea of flower child sundresses is a wholly new concept.
Modern concerns elevated Miller’s retro moment, and pieces crafted with recycled fabrics were some of the collection’s most exciting. Mixed print black-and-white separates decorated with checks and crosshatch demanded attention, as did the embroidery embellished dresses that took the swinging look into evening territory.
