Barbie may have been the star of New York Fashion Week to celebrate her 50th anniversary as a style icon for generations of girls, but at Au Jour Le Jour, Ms. Rainbow Brite had her moment to shine in the spotlight.
The design duo gave a nod to the ‘80s character’s trademark thigh-high rainbow socks through gladiator-style knee-high tops with buckles in an array of popping colors, which featured throughout.
Kooky kitsch was key in designers Diego Marquez and Mirko Fontana’s collection for spring, officially inspired by the thought of a giggling Japanese uniform-clad college schoolgirls engaged in a game of volleyball.
Show attendees took note of the ode to hit seventies manga Attack No1 as the show played out over two large volleyball courts, with the models marching past nets in sporty shorts, iridescent athletic anoraks and cheeky sheer dresses, which covered matching bra and pant sets.
A standout look was a patterned jacket featuring images of giant lips printed on technical nylon, an unlikely pairing on top of a windbreaker dotted covered in pictures of dolls and kittens.
The pair’s knack for making quirky cool was also evident in a pastel green windbreaker covered in fruit, worn with a structured white and white gladiators with a kaleidoscope rainbow of buckles.
Fun, youthful and not afraid to color outside the lines, the collection would appear just as at home on the young and the young at heart alike, with a pinafore-style Kelly green dress, embellished with gold sequins and worn over a patterned short-sleeve button-up, fit to take you from the playground to cocktail hour with your Tribeca mothers group posse.
Athletic silhouettes were glammed up with a dose of sparkle, which amplified the icon-driven aesthetic, while denim was given a makeover with intricate sequinning, perhaps not the most functional item to stuff in your gym bag after a sweaty session at the nets.
If Rainbow Brite’s gig is to use the colors of the rainbow to make our world brighter and our hearts lighter, then the designers’ pro bono positions as her honorary Color Kids allowed them to produce enough ‘magic sprinkles’ to produce a paint box of fun.
