By MONICA BEDI
There is something so intriguing about the the blossoming forms of nature that entrench our interest. Between nature and the temples that sit atop of mountains, there’s much to awe over. During Seoul Fashion week, an event that international fashion retailers and buyers look towards Asia for the latest trends and inspiration, there was one designer who breathed in, and exhaled out an earthy aura. By the name of Lie Sang Lie, a Fall/Winter 2011 collection sprung that presented a collection that invited an air of contemplation and captured the sense of movement found in nature.
According to the mayor of Seoul, Lie is the “Best Designer of the Year.†According to the fashion world, he is the “Korean McQueen.†According to everyone in between, he one of the most influential people in all of South Korea.
As a designer with perpetual creativity and growing commercial success that sets him above his peers, there’s nothing he hasn’t done. Lie has been featured in numerous publications including Le Figaro, Telegraph, New York Times, Vogue, Vanity Fair, Oyster, Standard, and W Magazine. With a growing presence in Europe, the United States, the Middle East, and Russia, Lies’s diverse influences range from the imperial love affair of Napoleon and Josephine, Korean poetry and calligraphy, cubism, bauhaus design, and 1930s film noir heroines. To say, South Korea’s First Lady, Beyonce, Rihanna, Lady Gaga, Peaches, Lindsay Lohan, and Juliette Binoche can attest to his fame, as they have all been dressed, and impressed in Lies’s high-fashion staples for noteworthy occasions.
As if that wasn’t enough for a resume of succession, Lies caught the attention of the world’s most notable fashionistas when he mixed elegant french fashion with exquisite oriental sensibilities at this year’s Seoul Fashion week.
Lie’s Fall/Winter 2011 collection was equivalent of a flower in the wild: eye-catching and universally appealing. Cultivating the fluid grace of arched lines and curved horizons in a harmonious way, symbols of Zen were reinterpreted with a modern twist. Symbols of Zen were found in the prints of traditional Korean landscape paintings and the patterns created by hand stitched embroideries. The essence of the mountains, wind, waves and clouds were echoed in the embroideries. Super-chic, decorative patterns were created by the juxtaposition of fabrics and colors.
Noble and natural fabrics such as wool, silk, cotton and leather were used with cloque details and combined with a restrained earthy palette of beige, brown, grey with splashes of gold.
As a youthful counterpoint, the silhouettes this season were more restrained than previous seasons and reflected the sense of calm of the collection. Fabrics were created that had a flower-like quality. The leather bags reinterpreted the ubiquitous cloth bags carried by monks without losing the simplicity of the original. More complacent, outerwear was referenced in the elegant feather light puffer jackets.
Grasping the phenomena of living things of nature, Lie Sang Lie’s collection naturally came alive.
Photos courtesy of Lie Sang Lie
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