Maria Cornejo

Zero + Maria Cornejo Spring 2013 | Runway
fashion week

Zero + Maria Cornejo Spring 2013

Maria Cornejo's show notes called her Spring 2013 collection future primitive.
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Zero + Maria Cornejo Spring 2013 | Runway

Maria Cornejo's show notes called her Spring 2013 collection future primitive. 'It's about looking towards the future, but with a nod to the past,' she said. The most forward-thinking thing about this collection in particular may be Cornejo's exercises with balanced shapes and squared hemlines — new tricks for a designer whose past collections have been concerned with asymmetry. The clothes this time were geometric in a different way: jackets made from scuba material had soft shoulders, slightly nipped in waists and ended in straight lines. Voluminous skirts jutted out at the thigh before coming to a close under the knee.

The color palette and imagery in the clothes helped with the futurism, too — steely grays and crisp whites felt clean, and a blue-and-black print was actually a photo of a Giacomo Balla sculpture from the '20s.

Cornejo gave the same treatment to a picture she took of crop circles from an airplane window and a street art collage. That sentimentality was part of this collection's look back at the past, as was the hand-knitted macrame from Bolivia and hand-crafted Victoria Simes jewelry included in the collection.

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Zero + Maria Cornejo Spring 2013 | Pictures
New York Fashion Week

Zero + Maria Cornejo Spring 2013

Maria Cornejo's show was set against a beautiful sunset at Pier 57, making for a surreal transition into her futuristic Spring '13 collection.
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Maria Cornejo's show was set against a beautiful sunset at Pier 57, making for a surreal transition into her futuristic Spring '13 collection. Using "neo" scuba textiles, the designer created sharp silhouettes mixed in with trademark unique prints this time culled from her own personal catalog and remixed with an abstract flair. Check out all the pictures from her collection, and come back soon for our full review.

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Maria Cornejo, Costella Tagliapietra, Monique Pean Named Inaugural CFDA/Lexus Eco Fashion Challenge Honorees
Monique Pean

Maria Cornejo, Costella Tagliapietra, Monique Pean Named Inaugural CFDA/Lexus Eco Fashion Challenge Honorees

>> Last night, Maria Cornejo, Jeffrey Costello and Robert Tagliapietra of Costello Tagliapietra, and Monique Pean were named the inaugural winners of the CFDA & Lexus Hybrid Living Eco Fashion Challenge.
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>> Last night, Maria Cornejo, Jeffrey Costello and Robert Tagliapietra of Costello Tagliapietra, and Monique Pean were named the inaugural winners of the CFDA & Lexus Hybrid Living Eco Fashion Challenge.

Each had to demonstrate a commitment to ecologically responsible design, with a minimum of 25 percent of their collection produced in an environmentally-friendly manner: Pean uses recycled gold and sustainable buffalo horn; Costello Tagliapietra creates fabric dyes in an eco-friendly way; and Cornejo employs sustainable manufacturing practices and uses fabric like cupro, which is typically discarded during the production of cotton. In turn, each was awarded $25,000 from Lexus to use toward their Fall 2011 presentation in February.

The other 2010 finalists included Alabama Chanin, Behnaz Sarafpour, Libertine by Johnson Hartig, Marcia Patmos, Organic by John Patrick, Slow and Steady Wins the Race by Mary Ping, and Subversive Jewelry by Justin Giunta.

Dana Lorenz Launches Fenton/Fallon for J.Crew Collection
J Crew

Dana Lorenz Launches Fenton/Fallon for J.Crew Collection

>> J.Crew stocks a heritage brand here and there, but it's not often that an up-and-coming designer is asked to collaborate with the brand.
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>> J.Crew stocks a heritage brand here and there, but it's not often that an up-and-coming designer is asked to collaborate with the brand. Not so for Fenton/Fallon's Dana Lorenz, of whom J.Crew creative director Jenna Lyons is a major fan: “We met at a dinner party at Maria Cornejo’s house. We were sitting next to each other and talking, and she mentioned that she was a jewelry designer . . . I asked her what jewelry she designed and she said Fenton/Fallon. I was like, Jesus Christ — I had a stack of papers on my desk of pictures of her necklaces and I had been trying to find them. None of them had names on her website, so I just printed them all out and would call Bergdorf and say, ‘Do you have this?’ They were like, ‘I don’t know, lady, you have to come up.’"

Thus, the Fenton/Fallon for J.Crew collection, "a mash-up" of her Fenton and Fallon brands, according to Lorenz, which runs $95 to $295, was born — and is now in stores.

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Francisco Costa Wants to Do Street Casting at Calvin Klein; Maria Cornejo Thinks the Press "Kills Things Before They Happen"
Calvin Klein

Francisco Costa Wants to Do Street Casting at Calvin Klein; Maria Cornejo Thinks the Press "Kills Things Before They Happen"

>> Francisco Costa, Maria Cornejo, and Yoehlee Teng touched on everything from model casting to celebrity dressing to eco fashion last Thursday night at the Cooper-Hewitt museum in New York as part of the “Voices in American Fashion” panel, moderated by The Washington Post's Robin Givhan.
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>> Francisco Costa, Maria Cornejo, and Yoehlee Teng touched on everything from model casting to celebrity dressing to eco fashion last Thursday night at the Cooper-Hewitt museum in New York as part of the “Voices in American Fashion” panel, moderated by The Washington Post's Robin Givhan.

Costa, who is known for his unique show casting, voiced one vision for a Calvin Klein show that he hasn't yet fulfilled — street casting. "I wish to be able to just go into the streets and just start going. As a concept, I would love to do that someday."

Cornejo rebutted: "I have to say, the first show I did in New York, I did have all real people, only one model, and it bombed. The editors do not want to see the clothes on real women. It's more exciting for them [to see the clothes on models]. They want to be able to say: 'Oh, I shot her last week.'"

Both designers agree, however, when it comes to using young models »

Mary-Kate Olsen

>> The Row to Do Jeans for Spring 2010 —Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen held their Spring 2010 showroom presentation for The Row today, and Who What Wear's Katherine Power Tweets: "such great jackets and for the first time, jeans!
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>> The Row to Do Jeans for Spring 2010 —Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen held their Spring 2010 showroom presentation for The Row today, and Who What Wear's Katherine Power Tweets: "such great jackets and for the first time, jeans! They look like vintage levis, so good."  O magazine's Adam Glassman snapped a picture of a mint green cardigan from the collection. [Katherine Power Twitter, Adam Glassman Twitter]

Rodarte, Inspired by Death Valley and Vultures, Go Goth Tribal Warrior for Spring 2010
Rodarte

Rodarte, Inspired by Death Valley and Vultures, Go Goth Tribal Warrior for Spring 2010

>> Laura Mulleavy told WWD she didn't sleep last night because she was so nervous about the Rodarte show — inspired by the singed Death Valley and "mangled and tattered" black vultures — today, but she had nothing to fear.
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>> Laura Mulleavy told WWD she didn't sleep last night because she was so nervous about the Rodarte show — inspired by the singed Death Valley and "mangled and tattered" black vultures — today, but she had nothing to fear. The room was packed for her and her sister Kate's Spring 2010 collection debut; crunchy black sand was on the floor, dry ice smoke filled the room, and a musky scent wafted through the room as part of a collaboration with fragrance company Firmenich. The first look emerged from the silver cave opening-like set, all plaid and burnt cheesecloth.  Following behind was lots of black, some feathers . . . deconstructed looks with tie dye and raw hems and patchwork.  Every model had her arms painted with makeup to appear like tribal tattoes, goth lips, and their hair wrapped in webbed wool.

Tavi of Style Rookie, the Mulleavys' muse, was front row, Nicholas Kirkwood did the heels again, causing one tumble and a trip by Karlie Loss, and frequent Rodarte collaborator Autumne de Wilde was backstage filming a Rodarte movie.  Full play-by-play here.

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2010 Spring

>> Rad Hourani's Goal Is To Have a Signature Piece —Rad Hourani continued his mostly-black, unisex aesthetic yesterday during his Spring 2010 presentation at Milk Studios, dressing both male and female models in leggings and heels paired with looser tops.  That base is nothing new for the designer, but this time, he added chain fringe detailing and touches of silver and white to keep it fresh — full collection here.  The look is here to stay, he says, because he doesn't "need to feel like I’m evolving or doing something new every season."
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>> Rad Hourani's Goal Is To Have a Signature Piece —Rad Hourani continued his mostly-black, unisex aesthetic yesterday during his Spring 2010 presentation at Milk Studios, dressing both male and female models in leggings and heels paired with looser tops.  That base is nothing new for the designer, but this time, he added chain fringe detailing and touches of silver and white to keep it fresh — full collection here.  The look is here to stay, he says, because he doesn't "need to feel like I’m evolving or doing something new every season." In fact, he's set himself up as kind of an anti-designer designer: "I am completely anti-trend and allergic to some of the things that people follow. I like quality or shapes that have no reference. People like to point things of the '60s, '70s, for example, and classify them. I like to have no seasons, or references and that’s how my pieces will stay timeless." The most important thing for him, he says, is to have a signature: "What would make me happy is someone on the streets today, tomorrow or in 10 years wearing a jacket of my collection and people knowing it’s Rad without having to look at the label." [Paper]