THE GREAT ESCAPE
Michael Kors transports us to ’70s Palm Springs for his luxury sportswear incarnation for cruise 2014.
Michael Kors take you on a journey to ’70s Palm Springs for his cruise collections
Every season Michael Kors takes us to a new destination. One season it’s the slopes in Aspen and the next, yachting in Portofino or on the beach in Malibu. For cruise 2014, the Michael Kors woman is poolside in Palm Springs, the chic resort town just two hours driving distance from Los Angeles in the Mojave Desert and the winter escape for Hollywood heavyweights since the ’20s. Famous for its endless sunshine, picturesque landscape and decadent poolside cabana cocktail scene, Palm Springs has come to represent style and sophistication. It has the highest concentration of mid-century modern architecture in the world, a design style that evolved after visionary architects embraced the desert environment and employed construction techniques to seamlessly blur the lines between indoors and out with the use of clean lines and glass. Everyone from Katherine Hepburn to Dean Martin and Marilyn Monroe built homes there. With the jet-set flocking, Palm Springs was the playground for the glitterati, immortalised through Slim Aarons’ lens, which captured hedonistic poolside soirées that began in the afternoon and went on through the night.
Michael Kors’ 2014 collection notes describe cruise 2104 as “Palm Springs Modern… a 21st-century take on sleek ’70s proportions.” Suntan, an officially coined colour this season makes up the core of the collection’s palette along with hues of geranium pink, black, white and blue. The “streamlined desert chic” collection of belted cashmere coats and jackets are sharply paired with matching flared pants that skim the bottom of s sky-high wedge wedges. Rich buttery leather minis worn with cable ca knit sweaters and midi-length, colour-blocked skirts and dresses feel sophisticated sophisticat and modern when paired with long-shouldered tailored bags or box clutches and modern lucite jewellery, which Kors casually styled, slung over the models’ shoulders and piled on their wrists respectively. Classic cut-out maillots come in graphic giraffe prints, and fresh updates on the two-piece with brief bottoms paired with belted t-shirt-style tops or lightweight knits. And there is classic Kors in the form of the perfect white pantsuit, airy column gowns and caftans that belong to any balmy beach in the world.
Cruise 2014 is quintessential American sportswear, yet completely translatable to the Singaporean woman who is not driven by trend but buys collectible classics in luxe fabrics and timeless elegant silhouettes—the starting points for the perfect wardrobe. This unfussy approach to dressing is a hallmark of Singaporean style—ultra luxe and incredibly indulgent, but discreet and simple as if one hasn’t tried too hard.