Neil Barrett s collections for women have tended to transpose his men s collections across the gender barrier with very little variation. The difference this time was that he had a female muse in mind. Binx Walton is a model of the moment, and when Barrett met her at the Christmas party he cohosted in London with Love magazine last December, he flipped his wig. Her hard-edged boy/girl thing was the very quintessence of the effect he wanted to achieve with his womenswear. And that s how Binx became the foundation of the collection Barrett presented in Paris today.
He softened Binx s hard edges a bit. The facing was extended on coats and jackets. A pleated ruff ran along the bottom of a biker jacket. Another leather jacket had a ruffled front. There were also pleats underneath a classic double-breasted jacket. Barrett wanted to add fluidity to classic masculine garments.
Still, it isn t really "soft" where his heart lies. The motif that dominated the collection was the lightning bolt, carried over from the men s collection. Barrett offered it as one big zap on a quilted blouson or as a techno Fair Isle pattern on knit. Continuing with the techno theme, there were op art spots and a photo-realist bear-fur print on sweatshirts. You could almost imagine a world where such an item might replace the real thing. That world already has a name—Gattaca. And Barrett s inside-out reconceptualizations of the classic MA-1 would make a perfect uniform.
