“We’re challenging ourselves,” Catherine Holstein declared in her NoHo showroom as she walked racks lined with her new resort collection. Khaite has become a badge of cool for fashionable women in New York and beyond, the crystal mesh Marcy flats and slant heel Arizona boots a kind of code shared between them. But Holstein’s ambitions are bigger than making the It shoe of the moment. Pointing to the nipped and tucked curving sleeves of a camel coat, among other tailored pieces, and the draped volumes of a pink gazar skirt, she explained that they’d designed the patterns using the principles of origami, the 2-d shapes creating more idiosyncratic 3-d ones. The cool Khaite woman now has a bonafide eccentric streak.
Other experiments with cut resulted in narrow jackets and coats with high armholes and a high break, and buttons marching in close succession down the torso. Holstein said they felt more “early ’90s” to her than recent seasons, which had more ’80s proportions. A double-breasted leather officer’s jacket with shoulder epaulets looked cool with a pair of barrel-legged jeans. If, as Holstein said, she’s determined to push herself and her team, she also expressed an interest in believability and wearability—hence those jeans and the inclusion of a double-face cashmere pullover, which looks like the kind of thing you’d put on at the start of the weekend and not want to take off.
All in all, you’ll notice an emphasis on evening in the lookbook. Some of the gazar pieces were layered over turtleneck bodysuits with built-in gloves, an editorial flourish that will be adapted as separate gloves in stores and online. The most persuasive after-dark look dialed down the quirky (a little bit challenging) shapes of other numbers in favor of a sleek body-limning silhouette draped from a halter neckline. It made a strong case that simple elegance is enough.