Jonny Johansson likes to build collections around what’s happening in his own life, so he’s currently tapping into his inner good vibrations — and the surfer lifestyle he’s adopted since buying a house in the Stockholm archipelago (“I’m not a thrill seeker — it’s more like soul surfing,” the creative director said). Inspired by hanging around surfboard workshops with The Grateful Dead blaring from speakers, his resort lineup is “about a Deadhead who becomes a mother and here’s the daughter.” In a tête-à-tête presentation at the Beaux-Arts, models in tie-dye sock sneakers and elevated Swedish clogs glided by in a sweet haze of psychedelic prints, oblivious to the swollen Seine below, with hand-carved tiger’s eye skulls hanging from string necklaces and enameled flower rings on their toes.
Silhouettes oscillated between slimline and generous. There were bleach-dyed slipdresses with psychedelic ink-blot stains and snug patterned knits with TV-staticlike motifs. Crinoline skirts added an anachronistic twist to asymmetric slipdresses. Hooks were a leitmotif, connecting panels of draped silk on dresses or acting as rivets on a deconstructed wool mélange oversize blazer.
Recalling his denim roots, Johansson got his hands dirty testing myriad dyeing processes, displayed in everything from oil-dyed T-shirts to a supersoft utilitarian cotton suit with 3-D pockets that had been sprayed, bleached and sand-blasted. Other standouts included a palate-cleansing voluminous sleeveless black dress accessorized with butter-soft black “harness gloves,” and a psychedelic oil print silk blouse with a bleached out Seventies-style floral photo print on the sleeves that was to dye for.
