As the late, great Professor Louise Wilson instructed her fashion students at Central Saint Martins MA when they were trying to be lost, confused and pretentiously designer-like: “Look at yourself in the mirror and start there.” Victoria Beckham never went to Central Saint Martins – then a mega pop star of the Spice Girls – but at this point in her fashion career she has wised up to let her autobiography guide her brand. “For me this is a very personal collection. It’s about my relationship with both dance and the British countryside,” she said before the show.
Her ballet aspirations “began when I was three,” culminating in early dance and performance classes in college (and the ill-fated Spice Girls audition). The British countryside was very contemporary: the Beckhams have a weekend house in Oxfordshire. Victoria knows her way around English rain boots, brogues and outdoor jackets.
All these elements are incorporated into the collection in the suggestion of jersey dresses and knitted tights for dancers, ‘humble fabrics from the rehearsal studio’ as she put it, to transparent tulle dresses that refer to ‘the performance’. Some pieces had internal wiring, “to create the illusion of a gesture or posture.”
Beckham’s storytelling embraced the relaxed, slightly deconstructed urban tailoring she’s developed (and worn) in recent seasons. Pretty cream-colored linen summer dresses were inspired by family weekend trips to a village antique shop that stocks tablecloths and napkins from the ’30s and ’40s “that remind me of my grandparents,” she said.
Her collection feels more centered and balanced as she draws from her lifestyle and experiences. The fact is that many women want to look like Beckham when they see themselves in the mirror; the growing success of her beauty brand proves that. The launch of her new perfumes – three scents named after important (and sexy) memories and locations in her life – coincided with her show. And who should provide the images for this, made by Steven Klein? Victoria herself of course.
