The Halo Dress

Halo Dress is from Derryn Schmidt’s summer collection. The fabric is a tightly woven silk-cotton, providing a background for colourful print work and some subtle details like the run of pin-tucking down the spine.

The print is a tumbling design of big peony/chrysanthemum blooms among cascades of cool coloured petals. It is serenely suggestive of oriental lacquer work and the imperial colours of oriental hand painted porcelain.

The name of Schmidt’s collection is Around in Circles. The phrase carries with it the idea that in creating something new, the spirit can often go around in circles, looking at things seen in the past, and techniques learnt, and then, behold, something fresh appears.

Terence H

Fun from Cooper

The dress is the ‘Frocktail Shaker’ -- a work in silk with four fringed belts done in soft gold cotton threads. Taking a cue from its name, it is indeed like a quenching built-up cocktail full of citrus curls and zests, topped with opaque lemon fizz.

The jacket is called ‘Kiss my Asp’. The pattern of reptile skin is done in leather, then overlaid and heat-set with a thin plastic skein. Here is a stunning replica of the fine textures and flashing iridescence of snake skin – both charming, and alarming.

The garments are from the summer collection of Cooper; a sub-collection of Trelise Cooper.

Cooper is a label dancing with the jazzy, the youthful, and the irreverent. It is a label of spirited collectables.

Terence H