After serving as the scenery for books and films like The English Patient and The Sheltering Sky, the Sahara desert has won the runways of fashion.
To create the spring-summer collection, stylists went after inspiration in the most exotic regions of the world. They got to the Sahara.
Famous brand Prada printed aerial photographs of the desert sand on their creations. In Brazil, the sands of Africa are present in the collections through fabric like linen and cotton.
“Colors cream, sand, beige and cashew are references to the desert,” explained Fashion and Style consultant Cristiane Gurgel. Apart from natural fabrics and light colors, the accessories also bring fragments of desert life.
Objects in the shape of animal fangs, of the elephants that live in the desert in Namibia, for example, should be seen adorning the necks of Brazilian women next summer.
The strongest theme of the season’s fashion will be ethnical, according to the fashion consultant at the National Service of Commercial Education (Senac), Luciana Parisi.
“The ethnic theme focuses on trips to exotic places,” she explained. This is why the Africans and their desert entered the runway as themes for inspiration.
Every year, thousands of tourists travel to countries with peculiar characteristics, like Morocco and Mauritania, interested in visiting the Sahara.
From the African continent the collections will also bring colors and prints imitating the skins of tigers, leopards, zebras and snakes. “Snake prints will be among the most common,” stated Cristiane. Snakes may be seen in the desert sands due to the heat.
Stylist Marcelo Sommer was one of the Brazilian fashion designers who showed the typical colors of Africa during the São Paulo Fashion Week, the largest event in the sector in Brazil, which ended Monday, July 4, in the capital of the southeastern Brazilian state of São Paulo.
He used fabrics made by the Dutch for clothes worn by African women. Beige is also part of the collection of the Brazilian stylist, mixed with brighter tones.
One of the tones of beige used in Sommer’s collection, and in those of other stylists, the strongest of them all, actually, recalls the typical safari clothes. Safari will be another face of the spring-summer shop windows.
According to Luciana, rolled up trouser legs and uniform style trousers, in the style of foreigners seeking adventure, will be included in the collections. “The clothes used by explorers served as inspiration,” stated the consultant.
World Fashion
But it is not only African themes that are going to guide fashion. Indian, Gypsy, Mexican, Cuban and Jamaican styles will also serve as bases for the creations.
They compose the ethnical face of the clothes that will be in shop windows in Brazil at the end of the year. But the fashion will also be romantic and modern. “The three great themes are romance, ethnics and modernism,” stated Luciana.
Romance will be translated into light raw materials, in naive style, with suave and floral tones.
“Loose dresses, for example, will continue on the high, in the purest romantic style,” explained the consultant.
Pink, that has been on the high for some years, should also be present in this season, but will share the ground with violet colors, like lilac.
Modernism should be shown in the geometric forms and cuts and should give priority to the comfort of the items.
“These are clothes for the executive woman, who likes the practicality of the casual,” she said.
According to the stylist, everything that is artistic will also be very much valued in the warm season. Crochet and macramé, however, will be on the high.
ANBA – www.anba.com.br
