Looking through the clothes in the Diane Von Furstenberg fall collection, one word kept coming to mind: ease. Dresses and tops are made to simply pull on over the head; pants and skirts have elastic waists—zipper closures are few and far between. “What I think is really important about DVF is how it made women feel in the ’70s. They felt empowered, and they felt free, and they didn’t feel constricted,” Nathan Jenden explained. “It was really important to her and it’s really important to me.”
On his second official go-around at DVF, Jenden is carefully considering not only all of the different life events that women get dressed for, but all of the different women that count DVF as their go-to brand. For daytime there was soft tailoring in broken pinstripes that provided a playful take on “power dressing,” worn with a sequined tweed bomber jacket; for evening, boho-inflected sheer gowns in arty plaids, sporty knitwear separates, and romantic-but-not-fragile ruffled and lace-trimmed dresses in pinstripes embedded with a secret “love is life” message in the fabric (Said Jenden, “This is Diane’s mantra.”)
For the younger set, he did kicky mini skirt suits in knit houndstooth or Von Furstenberg’s own favorite Ginkgo plant print; and lingerie-inspired matching tank tops and shorts. Outerwear was a strong component in the collection; many of the coats and jackets constructed to be reversible and featuring “look at me” shaggy faux fur (in burgundy or hunter green), or bold geometric patterns. Animal print also played a starring role in both decadent and oversized ’80s iterations, and abstracted pop-art takes that brought to mind Von Furstenberg’s iconic portrait by Andy Warhol.
You can’t have a DVF collection without a wrap dress, and this season Jenden included both faithful and more modern takes on the style—the former included jumpsuits with wrap bodices, an architectural mini dress made from sequin tweed and jersey that had none of the vintage associations of the classic, and a shirt-dress style with buttons on the bodice. “Some people say the [neckline on] the wrap dress is too low. And for me, all of these things are wardrobe problems. My job is to provide wardrobe solutions.”
