It’s impossible to come away from a PH5 show, or in this case presentation, without discovering something new. The brand occupies a “middle ground between science and technology and art,” as designer Zoe Champion put it, and the sources she turns to for inspiration reflect that broader remit. For fall, she and founder Wei Lin extracted ideas from Resurrecting the Sublime, a project that brings artists and scientists together to conjure the scents of plant species using pressed flowers. This informed her designs as well as the style of the lookbook. Unsurprisingly, florals were a motif, some appearing as fresh cuts, others looking like they were plastered upon a disintegrating or heat reactive plaid. This effect spoke to Champion’s more abstract interest in “stacking things together, pressing things on things, lots of different pieces of clothing sort of intersected and also dissected.”
Plaid also showed up on airy mesh tops meant for layering. The vibe at PH5 is maximalist, and this was reinforced by the season’s neon palette, which was applied to the brand’s signature jacquard knits as well as many-buttoned wool sweaters that can be customized and worn as a pull-over, cardigan or dickey. Buttons also allowed panels to come ff skirts that could be worn open or closed, to the waist or falling off it. Also on offer this season were reversible jackets that were woven on one side, knit on the other.
Like many designers this season, Champion wanted to draw the waist in. In addition to accomplishing this via trompe l’oeil, she did so through construction. Note the peplum tops that make use of a fluffy hand-done needle felting technique which adds to the brand’s arsenal of materials. “I think a lot of the time our pieces are very flat by nature and very streamlined,” said Champion, “so we really wanted to add this feeling of something being pressed onto it.” One reaction to this collection might be sensory overload: all that color, patter, shape and layering can be jarring. This collection read like a hyper pop take on fashion. At the same time it’s easy to see how Lin and Champion could use the techniques they’ve developed to create tonal, less extroverted pieces that could live in harmony alongside the more collectible seasonal motifs.