Karen Walker doesn t do much black. As she pointed out after her show today, navy is her fundamental neutral—"the god color," as a member of her team put it. Walker s preference for navy over black says a lot about her as a designer: In her eyes, the world is a more cheerful place than it is for most of her peers. And so at first blush, it seemed an odd fit that Walker s inspiration this season was Taxi Driver, the emblematic film of seventies New York grimness. Finding that out before the show was a bit like hearing that Katy Perry had covered "Love Will Tear Us Apart." Huh? Really?
Not that Walker doesn t have a subversive streak; she does. But her collections always have a lot of pep, and she didn t sacrifice any of it as she took on Scorsese s classic. "We were playing with the idea that Betsy and Iris, in that film, represent these two different kinds of American women," Walker explained. "Betsy is feminine and elegant and aloof; Iris is tough and girlish. We wanted to see how we could push those characters through our own look."
It hardly seemed possible, but Walker s extrapolations this season relied upon an even more emphatic use of print than usual. Blown-up checks and stripes girded a bunch of microdots and graphic florals, including a bang on-trend tropical floral in turquoise. Walker spun the prints into natty, forties-inspired dresses (Betsy) and pegged pants and little shorts (Iris).
There s always a menswear inflection in Walker s collections, and this season was no different: Alongside her signature boyfriend blazers, she also created a terrific, eye-searing print that magnified the texture of tweed, and a supersize houndstooth that was especially good in white and navy. In general, this show had a more formal feeling than is typical for Walker—the real story was those ladylike, forties-style dresses, which fit in nicely with this season s emerging trend of soigné looks. That said, tomboy Walker fans will have no trouble picking out pieces here.
