Travel back to 1930’s England with Anna Sui’s latest collection, inspired by the likes of Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple, Virginia Woolf’s book covers, and Clarice Cliff’s pottery.
All photography by Raoul Gatchalian
Much like the gripping twists and turns of a good mystery novel, Anna Sui’s AW24 collection — WHODUNNIT!!! — had us flipping the page for more. Drawing inspiration from Agatha Christie’s Miss Marple and all the tweed, argyle, and fair isles that come with the character, the designer brought the English countryside and old London to modern-day New York. “Every collection has a fantasy person,” Sui tells me after the show. “It could be, you know, a red-haired curly woman in the mountains of Scotland or I’ve had Chinese influences, it was Anna May Wong, or it could be Twiggy, or it could be a mixture.”
Although even without knowing Miss Marple’s influence on the collection, watching models walk down the hardwood floors at The Strand’s Rare Book Room, against shelves and shelves of timeless books, it was quite easy to identify the looks’ inspiration. Matching their spines in both hue and level of detail, the pieces seemed to jump off of the pages behind them, much like magic. But, of course, let’s not judge a book by its cover — for beyond the instant recognisable connection, there was so much more research that went into the designs that wowed the audience.
Throughout the collection, Sui worked with the romantic Evellina Vintage, a long-time friend and long-awaited collaborator. “Evellina’s one of my favourite vintage dealers. And for years I would look forward to her vintage shows. We got to be friends and we started talking about how we should do a collaboration, but I couldn’t figure out exactly how to do it. But when I was working on the collection, I came up with the concept. And I went to one of the vintage shows and I said, ‘Evellina, I figured it out. We’re gonna do it this way.’ And she liked it.”
Bringing the old and new together, the designer also looked to the contemporary, sparkling glamour of Clio Peppiatt — who created custom handbags for the show.
Separated into three sections, the first lineup brought the ceramic work of Clarice Cliff to life. A revolutionary potter in the 1920’s and 30’s who sold to the emerging working women of her time, she was known for her medley of browns and mustard shades. Sui gave the breakable pieces the soft drape of fabric, maintaining the level of detail. Reflecting the late artist’s quirky, shape-led painting style through plaids and checks, she layered patterns and hues to accomplish a similar effect in a most definitive Anna Sui manner.
The second colour palette to emerge on the runway was one full of blues, blacks, and creams — inspired by the hand-painted Virginia Woolf book covers and the Art Nouveau work of Aubrey Beardsley. “That was all up on my inspiration board,” Sui shared. Moving into the final section, glamorous evening wear transformed the space into a 30’s London nightclub. And it’s safe to say we didn’t want to go back to reality.
