Jonathan Saunders doesn’t need a fancy intellectual explanation for the collection he showed at the Tate Britain Museum in London for spring 2014. He has long been hailed as a superb colorist, showing his first collection a decade ago, when he was already lauded as a print master for the likes of Alexander McQueen.
As a young designer from Brixton, he took great pleasure in making clothes for his girlfriends and stated that it was the energy and eccentricity of those same friends who inspired his latest looks. “It’s free-spirited, more casual I suppose—the way my friends want to dress” said Saunders. His skirts of pretty tiered pleats and starburst florals were paired with see-through embroidered Western shirts with covered satin placards and accessorized with granny glasses with colored lenses in red, blue, violet and gold tints.
Saunders incredible skill as a colorist found expression in collages of opium poppies printed on silk or shimmering organza and fanciful Western style color blocked jackets worn over degrade skirts and silk satin shorts. His unusual color combinations and fading degraded treatments in ice blue, ochre, beige, orange, pale pink and burgundy draw the eye in to better view the lovely cheongsam-like side-slits of dresses trimmed with bows and the colorful multistrap necklines of cocktail slip dresses.
Saunders offered a multitude of coordinating separates, from satin flower embroidered bomber jackets over dresses and fluid sweatpants, to knee-length satin shorts and high-waisted suede skirts worn with sheer flower-embroidered Western-style yoked blouses. Working on his menswear line has helped to evolve Saunders’ approach to womenswear, injecting it with a more relaxed silhouette that still looks new and polished with a seductive ease.
Saunders is your go-to guy for whimsical pieces that go beyond the fail safe knee length shifts and short dresses of spring when you really want a fun piece that breaks all the color rules.
