Jenny Packham has had quite the week. When we connect, she’s en route to the U.S. to celebrate the capsule collection she designed for the 60th anniversary of the James Bond franchise, consisting of six dramatic gowns inspired by a film from each decade. Even more notably, Packham set the internet alight when her riff on Goldfinger was worn by the Duchess of Cambridge to the London premiere of No Time to Die on Tuesday, here reimagined as a caped dress featuring a dazzling explosion of golden sequins, crystals, and glitter tulle. As far as promo for a new collection goes, it doesn’t get much better than that.
With her headline-grabbing return to high glamour, it seems the Duchess is ready to put on her dancing shoes again—and thankfully, so is Packham. “Everyone I speak to at the moment is talking about dressing up and going out, and I think you really are designing for people to escape all of the burdens of life right now,” she says. “After the year we’ve had, there’s even more reason to design in a much more free-spirited way. I can’t give that any more gravity, that’s just what we do. That’s our job.”
For spring, this energy was channeled in a way that felt lighter, in both a literal and metaphorical sense. First, the color palette. Packham moved away from the heavily sequined jewel tones of the past few seasons and into something lip-smackingly fresh, from pastel blues and peachy pinks to a delicate ombré tulle that faded from pale yellow to a gossamer white. Second, the textiles. Lurex chiffon was draped into a Grecian dress with loose sleeves that fluttered in the artificial wind of the studio, while crepe silks were lightly smattered with teardrop paillettes that managed to feel ethereal rather than heavy.
For Packham, this sense of lightness wasn’t just one embodied by the look and feel of the clothes, however; it was also the collection’s philosophical backbone. In a more cerebral reference than her usual odes to Old Hollywood or classic English glamour, her starting point came about after she re-read Milan Kundera’s The Unbearable Lightness of Being—a favorite of hers from her days at Central Saint Martins—and began thinking about the way in which Kundera’s characters negotiate the twin pulls of pleasure and instant gratification with the responsibilities of adulthood.
“I think as a designer, especially at the moment, people want more depth,” says Packham. “In the book, Milan Kundera talks about how you have a choice in life: You can either sign up for this burden of commitment that gives you long-term, steady contentment, or you can go for this lighter, freer approach devoid of responsibility and the highs and lows that come with that.” For so light a collection, it feels like heady stuff—not that it matters much to her loyal client base, for whom these delightfully playful dresses will be catnip regardless. Still, with her shrewd ability to balance whimsy with commercial nous, what side of the fence does Packham sit on? Ever the diplomat, she adds, smiling: “For me, it’s a combination of both.”
