RECENTLY returning from Formentera, Spain, Iranian-American designer, Maryam Nassir Zadeh’s love for summer, home and the sea were at the foundation of her SS20 collection, shown yesterday at New York Fashion Week. The pared back setting of the show itself, a public court in Chinatown’s Sara D. Roosevelt park, aided in creating a space symbolic of Zadeh’s downtown New York roots and eclecticism.
Though some aquatic references were fairly obvious – a lone white bikini, beach slip-esque sundresses, there were other more subtle hints of the seaside – blue and white floral dresses were less akin to blooming bouquets and more referential of underwater plants. Zadeh’s glass jewellery pendants, came in the shape of Mediterranean posidonia, a kind of seagrass only found on the seabeds of Ibiza and Formentera, two places the designer has vacationed since she was a child.
Other looks showed off the hand-crafted approach of the designer and her clear seventies inspiration, crochet crop tops barred mid-drifts, mini-dresses paired with dainty white lace gloves and sandals, golden belts cinched shirts and ruffled skirts.
Although more subdued than her previous shows, Zadeh’s SS20 collection succeeds in its meditation on themes of clarity, fluidity and community.
by Mirabella Shahidullah