The operating word at 6397 last season was hard. There was a toughness to the spring lineup, and, as Stella Ishii and her lead designer Lizzie Owens admitted at a preview of their resort collection, a certain youthfulness. In an effort to cast both a wider net and to give themselves room for exploration, the pair was after softness and a sense of maturity this season.
Owens’s presence at 6397 has been a boon for Ishii in that it has made their collections more introspective, and given them more gravitas. Ishii is an industry veteran and a beloved mentor, but she’s not fond of producing autobiographical or self-referential work past looking at the vintage pieces in her wardrobe. Together, they’ve put together a collection of simple yet desirable pieces.
“Perfectly touched, perfectly balanced,” is how Owens described the lineup. That rang true in a perfectly slouchy double-breasted jacket cut in a lightweight twill and a bomber jacket (with no cinching at the hem or cuffs) made in a liquid-y cotton. There was also a fantastic shirtdress constructed from the most weightless of fabrics, its collar stitched down for a trompe l’œil effect together with a non-functional placket, and a relaxed trench that Owens said was the beginning of this exploration into softer territory.
Pinned on the 6397 moodboard were a variety of images including kids, New York women, and snapshots of Junya Watanabe’s fall 2004 ready-to-wear show (he and Ishii share a mentor of their own in Rei Kawakubo). The most compelling result of the Owens and Ishhii’s seasonal conversations remains their ability to absorb a myriad of references and distill them into the kind of clothes we’d all like to live in.