Here s a little summary of everything Zac Posen has going on at the moment: a new deal to design Delta Airlines uniforms for 60,000 employees; a gig as Brooks Brothers creative director of womenswear (his first collection will make its debut in September); a long-standing role on Project Runway; and not one, but three collections bearing his name—Zac Posen, a lower-priced ZAC Zac Posen line, and Truly Zac Posen, a bridal offering. He also played chaperone to Maya Thurman-Hawke, eldest child of Uma and Ethan, at the CFDA Awards on Monday night. How he found the time to design the Resort collection he presented today is anybody s guess, especially considering that Posen keeps pushing into new territory.
There was a time we all remember when Posen was Mr. Drama; every gown seemed to come with horsehair crinolines and every suit with a boned corset. Somewhere along the way, though, he softened up. More often than not, the clothes he showed this afternoon were cut away from the body. Posen mentioned a photograph of his great-aunt dating to the early part of the 20th century: "She was in men s clothes," he said. The old picture gave him the zoot suit proportions of his suits. If his dresses did hug curves, they did so a little less insistently than usual. Nearly every look—day, night, short, knee-length, and long—was accessorized with flats. It didn t necessarily work in the case of a too-long wrap skirt, but the impulse—to emphasize ease—was appreciated. As for high-drama evening gowns, in the end there were the two. The first was strapless and column-thin in a floral brocade, and the second, grand in midnight blue silk. Both of them looked terrific.
