Black & White

FASHION Black & White

LIKE BESOTTED LOVERS, THESE CONTRARY HUES JUST CAN’T SEEM TO

STAY AWAY FROM EACH OTHER.

By Rita Guarna

What’s new for fall? A familiar duo’s back: pure white and basic black.

Now, before you protest that pairing these potent polarities couldn’t possibly be novel, that each is the other’s confounding retort and it’s all settled, that salt and pepper have been goin’ at it since the invention of night and day with no clear winner, that chessboards and piano keys and zebras have made this matchup mundane, that early televisions twinkled with these opposites in the late 1940s and daguerreotypes froze them a century before, that even author Truman Capote’s famed masked black-andwhite ball was, after all, 55 years ago, before you say all this—take a look at the bold and unexpected vivacity on these next six pages. Check out the monochromatic magic of arresting shapes and patterns that can pop like a firecracker when these contrary hues meet again as if for the first time. You’ll see why top fashion designers such as Carolina Herrera and Mossi Traoré can’t resist this combo, why its dialectic in the right ingenious hands can make even the brassiest rainbow self-conscious and envious. What’s new? As you see, black-andwhite is new—as new as this evening, as new as forever.

This page: A sleek, houndstooth-patterned dress from Krizia is amped up by a black breastpiece reminiscent of a formal gent’s bow tie, matching the black handbag she carries. Opposite page: With stylized, silhouetted vinery, this flowing, more-than-floor-length gown by Oscar de la Renta makes a sweeping statement.

This page, left and right: Flattering verticals (and broad silver bracelets) carry the day in these Max Mara creations, while our eye is entertained by a coolly kaleidoscopic array of monochromatic patterns (and, on the left, a textural departure in stunning black). Opposite page: You’re seeing spots not because you’ve been smacked on the head, but because this spot-on design struck the prolific fancy of designer Carolina Herrera. (Again, the floor is not the limit.)

This page, left and right: The apparently anarchic agenda of thick swirls in the black-and-white ensemble at left (not-too-distant kin to the pattern on the stockings at right) and the brazenly box-like shoulders on the capelike creation at right affirm the notion that elegance can come with a slight tincture of the unpredictable. Both designs by Mossi. Opposite page: This casual outfit from Oscar de la Renta takes advantage of a German scientist’s insight that was recently upheld by two British psychologists: Whatever your mother told you, horizontal stripes can be thinning. BACHENDORF’S 41