Ottolinger is growing up. “A woman emerges,” went one stanza of the short poem that stood in for collection notes. Backstage before the show, Cosima Gadient and Christa Bösch described their decision to move from a pre-fall “hug” to incipient adulting, complete with button-downs, ties and suiting and, importantly, age-positive, body-positive casting.
“We felt strongly that when times are tough, it’s good to have a shell that gives you power and the confidence that you’re in charge of your life, but not in an aggressive way.” Gadient explained. “As women designers, we believe we all need to stick together. We told all the girls in the lineup, ‘you’re a boss-woman.’”
Deconstructed knits dominated the first part of the show: cardigans and pullovers with slashed, squared necklines had tendrils trailing from neck and waist. Bottoms, whether in pant, skirt or dress form, were draped or wrested. There were twisted riffs on sweats, perhaps paired with wedge-heeled sneakers. “It’s somewhere between casual and airport looks,” Bösch offered of this lounge-y section.
But the real evolution here was tailoring, notably peacoat/perfecto hybrids with dropped waists, or tweed suiting flecked with bottle green. Those pieces brought a new facet to the designers’ world, as did some sharp suiting, in black or pinstripes with draped, gathered details in back.
Not that Ottolinger left its base behind: there were plenty of trompe l oeil numbers in stretch mesh, such as one that somehow managed to bring together a lilac button-down, a red striped necktie and panels of leopard print on a single dress. Elsewhere, a tight little top and canary yellow pants in faux leather riffed on Swiss tropes: that’s because they were a part of a capsule collection developed in collaboration with Swisscom and dubbed 079 after the local phone prefix.
A tad gimmicky, certainly, but all in good fun. The real progress here was that the designers are maturing, and judging by the turnout, their base will be happy to go along. For designers of any age, pulling that off is the real trick.
