None of the patrons are dressed in pastel colors. The room is teamed with black and white, thick and thin multi-directional stripes, silk screened patterns of dark burgundy and dense blues. The audience filing in fills the stark white space as a bruise against creamy flesh, a beautifully layered, long-legged bruise. Perhaps its coincidence that the audience so divinely foreshadows the much awaited collection of Rad Hourani’s SS10 show or perhaps its divine alignment. Either way, its RAD’s wet dream.
And then the heavy disco beat drops from above – the sound of electronic music from outer space. The first model appears clad in tight black spandex, square-toed boots and a layer of silver mesh much like chain mail stitched to the pants’ front. The audience stares attentively, studying the razor sharp quality of Hourani’s fitted leggings and loosely sheer, sleeveless shirts. There is no spring color, no flash of whimsical pink. Instead there is an alien-like quality to match the disco music, to match the darkly dressed crowd eagerly peering in. Rad Hourani’s clothes are the true beautiful bruise – blacks, metallics and fiercely silver zippers scattered obscurely across jackets astound the eye against the stark contrast of white half-pants (a la trendy bike short) and slitted leggings.
Layered with free flowing, silken panels, transparent blouses and abstract vests, Hourani’s collection draws from the pool of our newest, most timeless trend – anti-conformity. Hourani calls them “SOPHISTICATED MODERN CLASSICS FOR ANTI-CONFORMIST INDIVIDUALS.” We call them angelically a-seasonal in their sinister, darkly tinted freedom. With squared off shoulders and sleek, leather straightness, there is a strength to Hourani’s newest collection sought out by the young followers of androgynous fashion. Unlike the hipster set, whose clothes are most often not only repeatable, but recyclable, Hourani goes the extra step in his alien-like, atypical world – his clothes are not for the insecure and afraid.
With professionally placed slits in straight legged, leather pants, black buckles vertically positioned into thickly felt-esque coats, chain wire mesh and seemingly randomly placed zippers, Hourani’s collection summons the gloriously strange suit of an armed warrior – armed, of course, with strong attitude, thick-heeled shoes, a unique love of leather and more genuine revery for the experimental, self-expressive runway than hipsters have could even handle.
Go to Scallywag’s Photo Gallery.
