Best of 2008: Asian American Films
APA recaps the year in Asian American cinema with its third annual top ten.
Best of 2008: (Not so) Guilty Pleasures
Our innocent tastes are sometime so, so guilty. But in a year when such luminaries as Vanessa Hudgens, BoA, and Edison Chen make headlines, can you really blame us?
Subscribe to the APA Newsletter
(L to R) pieces from Andrew Gn, Jason Wu and Peter Som.
Best of 2008: Fashion
It has been an exciting year for Asian/Asian American fashion designers as many of them joined the top designers of industry in offering eponymous ready-to-wear lines. APA looks back at Fall 2008 and Spring 2009 collections from the top Asian/Asian American designers of 2008.
Jason Wu
For Fall 08, Jason Wu put forth a smart collection for the lady in today's woman. He expertly combined florals and stripes, silk and wool, along with leather accessories in silhouettes that harken the 1940s, an era when female fashion reflected a balance between 1930s sass and the ideal conservatism of the 1950s. Wu's woman as a polished sophisticate re-emerges with more girlish buoyancy in the Spring 09 line as she dons Bermuda shorts, pleated skirts, and full length dresses in alternately bold hues and airy pastels. It's why her knees only peek a little past the hemlines and her waistline is always emphasized with a skinny belt or just plain good tailoring.
Andrew Gn
A nearly all-black collection can just as easily strike one as too severe or overly safe. Andrew Gn avoided such conclusions in Fall 08, however, as he broke up the monotony with astutely well cut pieces that mix soft and sturdy fabrics. It's his sumptuous gowns, that sharpen Gn's modern interpretation of British Regency, fused with a Goth kid's Victorian styling. By Spring 09, he returns to (more) color with a line of predominantly bright paisley pieces, often anchored by equally striking accessories -– such as necklaces, cuffs, belts, and or pairs of shoes –- from the same color family as the piece it is paired with.
Peter Som
According to past fashion coverage, Peter Som was heavily inspired by photographer Diane Arbus, known for black and white portraits of New Yorkers that challenged notions of appearance versus image. In filtering his Fall 08 collection through Arbus, Som relayed an array of shapes, from layered tartan skirts and voluminous tweed trousers to flouncy organza cocktail dresses that nevertheless looked cohesive. His Spring 09 collection views like a glitzy Hollywood production set in the desert. Fitted, neutral-toned pieces accented with chocolate brown corset belts soon transition to standout dresses and skirts punctuated by large flower patterns in solid shades.
Derek Lam
In just a few short years, Derek Lam has become synonymous with an urban luxuriousness that straddles everyday pragmatism and big city glamour. His first collection of high-end handbags for one thing was equal parts supple leather and fanciful gold ram ornaments that he commissioned from a Florentine jeweler. What he offered for Fall 08 only followed this style trajectory. Lam imagined his clients preparing for winter with plenty of refined coats, layered knits, skinny trousers, as well as dresses and skirts over textured hose. Goosebumps after all are neither practical, nor chic. With Lam's Spring 09 offering, women who duly covered up during colder months are rewarded with lightweight fabrics such as a jersey done in breezy, forgiving contours.
Naeem Khan
For both his Fall 08 and Spring 09 lines, Naeem Khan has little space for minimalism. In fact, as seen so far, excess is not uncommon in Khan's aesthetic. He turned to such materials and accents as fur trimming, beaded lace, and crystals (among other design flourishes) to highlight the Bohemian-influenced Fall 08 collection. He manages to keep it one note away from gaudy by keeping a fairly basic color palette with mostly black, white, pale gold, and silver pieces. Khan doesn't stray from his dauntless penchant for shine in Spring 09 as he experiments with vibrant brocades, glossy embroidery, and flashes of fiery reds and oranges. Whereas he missed on several points due to quite literal interpretations of his design inspirations, he shows promise in that he, not unlike Versace and Cavalli, keeps the sartorial wishes of unabashedly sexy women in mind.
Anna Sui
Anna Sui has long kept an archive of fashion magazine clippings deemed as the "genius files" to fuel her creativity. This resevoir of inspiration has continually lent her clothes an almost erudite air. She knows her history and those who appreciate her designs do as well. For an artist that often switches things up from one season to the next, it is the one long-running strand that ties all her collections throughout her career. Her Fall 08 and Spring 09 collections are perfect examples of this. She dressed women in a pastiche of influences that included pre-Raphaelite silhouettes and Native American flair for the fall/winter season. Her pieces warmed as the weather did in the following season. She sees women indulging in folkloric embellishments, multi-textural patterns, and in true Sui credo, good old fashioned fun.
Richard Chai
Richard Chai created a Fall 08 collection that not only appeals to women who do not want to sacrifice style for warmth, but to those who'd prefer to make it effortless as well. He even offered a selection of cool and warm hues, not forgetting that some match their wardrobe with the colors of winter and others like it bronzier. Each piece can easily be mixed and matched with the other, whether one wants to follow what was shown on the runway or not. He extended the consideration to Spring 09 as the light and dark pieces radiated the same effortlessness from fall.
Doo-Ri Chung
Doo-Ri Chung strays little, if ever, from her vision of femininity as unfussy and classy. She produced both Fall 08 and Spring 09 with the same unflailing sense of the modern woman. Her clothes continue to be classic pieces that can last longer than its debut season, with an update of accessories here and there. This timelessness in her fashion perspective is what entices fans of hers to check out what she has conjured each season.
Koi Suwannagate
The artistry of Koi Suwannagate can be seen in her Fall 08 knit pieces. Rosettes and appliques on knitwear are tricky –- if not careful in design and production, they can easily make a sweater or cardigan dowdy, matronly, and sometimes even hopelessly too young. It takes discipline to not overwhelm a piece with too much detail. Suwannagate pulls this off by keeping the outline of each piece rather clean, only adding splashes of color and trims in the right places. The result is a range of knit pieces that would allow a woman to retain her youthfulness without losing a bit of dignity.
Thakoon Panichgul
Thakoon Panichgul is fearless when it comes to contrast. He rose to fame among fashionistas for his daring ready-to-wear collections. The runway is not the only forum for his creations however. He recently joined other young talents such as Richard Chai in designing more affordable pieces for Target's Go International brand. His ability to incorporate disparate elements only show that he sees and wants to inspire cohesion. Fall 08 for Thakoon was a not so much as a time dress warmly for the weather as it was to mesh the soft with durable, prints and solids, translucent and opaque.
Back to APA's Best of 2008 issue
Date Posted: 12/26/2008