Sebastien Amisial’s spring collection was inspired by winemaking. “Starting from cultivating the soil, planting the seed and the seed turning into a grapes, grapes turning, being pulled, pulverized, and then cured so they can turn into wine, and then that being aged beautifully so you can enjoy it or just hold onto it,” the designer described during a Zoom appointment the morning after his show. “That whole process is very synonymous to a lot of ideologies pertaining to our growth.”
It was a reflection on how far Sebastien and his partner Marianne Amisial have come since they first started their label four years ago, when it was named a finalist in the CFDA/Vogue Fashion Fund, and they staged their first runway presentation during New York Fashion Week, but it was also present in the clothes themselves—especially in the color palette. A sporty zip-up jacket and a long pleated skirt in a burgundy faux leather made for a more casual take on the skirt suit, and was accessorized with a maroon sweater artfully tied around the shoulders. “The faux leather has this liquidy waxy context and it almost sticks to the body, which is really amazing,” Sebastien said. “We wanted to have a balance between real leather and faux-leather because there are just some things that leather can’t do.” The real leather pieces though, were some of the standouts of the collection. Made from Verona leather dyed black and then hand-distressed to a shade of mustardy-olive, they used it on a couple of wardrobe essentials; a pair of straight leg jeans, and a terrific slouchy hooded bomber jacket with fleece lining. More unexpected were the pieces in shades of green, taken from white grapes, like the double breasted jacket in seafoam green bouclé wool belted and worn as a dress, and an all-knit wool cashmere ensemble of slouchy “sweatpants,” a polo neck sweater, plus another sweater draped around the shoulders in a shade that one could call tea green, that added a freshness to the lineup.
There was much to like in this collection—cropped denim jackets with rivet details, flocked denim pieces in a shade of deep mossy green that caught the light beautifully, swingy pleated shorts, and a great wrap shirt with lapels that’s sure to become their signature. Two versions were shown, one in white cotton worn as an overshirt with a mesh tank and khaki shorts that was summer incarnate; and another in denim, underneath a dark brown tweed overcoat and matching elastic waist trousers, that was dramatic and very sexy.
