Outside the Area show at the Frick, a scene unfolded. On Madison Avenue, black luxury vans stopped to let out a myriad of celebrities and influencers: the rapper Saucy Santana, the singer Becky G, and the former reality television star Christine Quinn, whose yellow feathered bustier and tweed micro shorts were immediate fodder for a Daily Mail article (“Christine Quinn puts on a busty display in a yellow feathered crop top and TINY shorts as she steps out in the Big Apple for New York Fashion Week”). They stopped traffic and brought a bit of fashion fantasy to the uptown after-school pickup crowd. At some shows the celebrity contingent can seem forced, but at Area it makes perfect sense; who else but Coi Leray could pull off a bedazzled bustier the length of an Area logo with little bloomer shorts, a gathered pink chiffon hat, and jewel encrusted sandals that snake up around the leg up to the thigh, wrapping it in diamonds?
The opening look, a cage dress made from bands of Japanese selvedge denim and covered in jumbo spikes around the body, sleeves and neck, was an immediate plea to be left alone, but worn with flat sandals, you could almost imagine the practical implications of wearing such a garment out in the real world—perhaps to take the train by oneself late at night? If it wasn’t obvious that underneath the spikes there was a wearable sporty denim dress, then the second look, a bustier with a sweetheart necklace and a matching miniskirt also made of denim, and featuring the season’s “folded bondage bow,” as it was named it in the show notes, finished spelling it out. At Area there is constant exploration of the liminal space between aggression and rebellion and making beautiful clothes that sell.
“For me it’s always been so hard to understand that there’s this separation between stuff that you sell and stuff that you dream of,” designer Piotrek Panszczyk said after the show. “And it’s really about connecting the dots and showing people how they’re related to each other, and why both are really important.” And so if you looked beyond the jumbo spikes and the folded pyramid elements and the fantastic sculptural pieces that are Area’s signature, you’d notice the sporty jersey track pants with multicolor Swarovski details down the side worn with an easy sleeveless tank with a cutout detail at the chest, or the silver velvet jeans worn with a matching bustier. You’d also spot a series of cocktail dresses that were classic in their execution, including a purple mini dress with a pleated detail at the sweetheart neckline (“Purple is this kind of religious color, there’s something very priest-like about it, so we wanted to embrace that and twist it and show it in a different way,” Panszczyk explained). A red floor length structured slip dress with all over embellishment stood out, too. Area also announced a collaboration with Sergio Rossi for this season, who did several pairs of high heeled strappy sandals as well as a pair of flats.
Panszczyk said he began this season thinking about the idea of “fetish” or “fetishizing fashion.” “For us, fetishizing something is really being obsessed with it, and really being dedicated to it,” he said. The dedication is paying off.
