New York Fashion Week :: Yeohlee [The ZOO]

New York Fashion Week :: Yeohlee

Yeohlee :: Fall 2006

On the sixteenth floor of a building with virtually no lobby, Yeohlee and her determined staff were up to bat at the bottom of the ninth, bases loaded, and in need of every runner to cross the plate. (I know! Baseball metaphors in fashion? Ungodly!) With bell and chime music so quiet you could hear photographers mumbling expletives and opening and shutting their shutters, there was a tightly packed crowd and a tiny runway.

As I sat listening to the headset adorning woman, saying "Noelle...Go! Jovita...Go!" it became clear to me that this show was virtually inside out, naked, with its heart on an operating table. The producers were pokerfaced, brave, and graceful. While the crowd was acting like corralled bulls, the models like matadors. Working only in black and white, Yeohlee's newly invented garments included high-waisted cumberbun trousers with suspenders, skinny black ties, and experiments with heavier fabrics.

Leaving space around the body rather than hugging the skin, Yeohlee's distinctively Mediterranean models looked straight out of film noir. A brown leaf print wrap around coat threw warmer tones over the blacks and browns in the end. A muted plum heated the fabrics as well. Yeohlee took a bow, grateful and wise.

STRENGTHS: Fabrics as sculpture, i.e. the black dress at the end, with a skirt that seemed to be filled with air. MODELS: So few of them, so many looks, such brave faces. ART: Every piece belonged in a museum where you could touch, rotate, and try on. SUPERSIZE: The blazers and legs were oversized, but the cumberbun trousers maintained lean silhouettes. [Xenia Viray]