There was an abundance of Jewish design talent at London Fashion Week, with designers revealing their creative ability in fashion-forward clothing and desirable accessories for autumn/winter 2010.
With a ravishing collection shown at London’s Royal Opera House, Nicole Farhi — doyenne of British fashion and the UK’s highest profile Jewish designer — demonstrated her ability to reinvent herself for a new, younger clientele with an immaculate, colourful collection that had more than a touch of 1940s Hollywood glamour.
David Saunders, the Chelsea College of Art-trained designer behind the fashion label David David (which he runs with his brother Michael, a former corporate tax lawyer), was the most cutting-edge among Jewish designers at LFW.
Showcased as part of the New Generation group, the Grimsby-born Saunders used bold, geometric-print silk in vibrant shades of yellow, red, purple and green. His clothes are already on sale at Harvey Nichols and Matches.
Eco-warriors in search of fashion-forward pieces will love the clothes of Lucy Tammam, who produced a wedding dress in peace silk (the worms don’t die). Less eco, more elitist, Tania Lawrie, the London-based, Israeli-born designer behind Tania, showed an accomplished, desirable cashmere collection.
Knitwear was also the focus of the collection by Jane Lewis at Goat, where huge leather buttons adorned a desirable half-sleeve knit coat.
Among Jewish accessory designers, Tamara Fogle produced an innovative and hugely desirable collection of bags.
Fogle — sister of TV explorer Ben — uses antique fabrics reclaimed from German grain sacks for her bags.
There are slightly more conventional clutch bags from Zoe Halfon at Pappa Razzi, who has a whole new collection of her hallmark “magazine” clutches.
Clever jewellery designer Nicky Gewirtz, the creative hand behind Lola Rose, again showed her talent for using bold shapes and stunning colours.
As well as lots of grey and black for winter, she also produced her oversized cocktail rings, bangles, bracelets, lozenge-shaped pendants and bold beads. For the first time, she also included scarves in her collection, with plain, print and foil-stamped pashmina-scale scarves in colours to bring some cheer to next autumn.
