SS 2010, Prada Gets Pretty

After seasons of ugly cloak for the sake of being ugly (intellectual, inner beauty, whatever), Prada finally returns to prettiness.

On the surface, this collection reminds me of the FW2004 collection. (Hands down, FW04 is my all time favorite Prada collection, and I pray twice a year that Prada pulls it off again.) Some of the looks influenced me in a great deal and a look like the following became one of my “uniforms”:

Looking closely, however, the 1960s beach prints look tacky and will last one season and one season only. Unlikely the more abstract prints she used in FW04 (and many other collections), Mucia Prada chose the tacky, if not borderline cheap prints. Here, cheap doesn’t mean inexpensive. Ms. Prada explained that she was doing nostalgia and interpreting rich and poor. She went so far as to ask the mill to weave nylon (a symbol of being poor) threads into silk duchesse (a kind of rich fabric that is often times used in couture clothing) fabric. It turns out that the "synthetic" fabric actually costs more than pure silk. How ironic.

Some, represented by Cathy Horyn, have criticized this collection as not sophisticated or intellectual. Tack prints aside, I do find the change refreshing: women don’t need to dress ugly to look sophisticated. Sure, those tacky prints won’t make any one look sophisticated, but the solid colors do. I am certain that the Prada boutiques around the globe will be filled with variations of the short jackets, with unfinished fringes hanging on the bottom, but in solid color. I found them refreshing and borderline office appropriate. There are simple little jackets that will just pick up your mood in a humid Sunday morning. Why not?

Some douches silk ensembles also reminds me of Cristobal Balenciaga’s creations, although one can be sure that corsets are absent. By the way, we’ve just watched the movie Coco Before Chanel, and I thank Ms. Chanel for liberate women from corsets. It was a defining event that made women more equal.

Mucia Prada certainly shares the business minds of Coco Chanel’s. I’m certain that the new collection will be a commercial hit. This will only help after Prada just gave up an IPO, for perhaps the third time.