'People have always wanted to talk to me about androgyny,' said 1205 designer Paula Gerbase backstage, clearly in the mood to start a new conversation with her spring show. 'I would like to do a show without that being discussed,' explaining her decision to nix the usual menswear contingency from her runway presentation. Right from the start a new freedom was snipped into the former Savile Row designer's billowing, cotton voile smock dresses. A softening that soon followed in the generous drape of her wide-legged cropped pants, and kimono jackets - secured with a simple bronze bar. Exchanging androgyny for utilitarian influences, rectangular tabards were cloaked over capri-length pants, fastened by buttons running up each leg. Perhaps the most interesting element of the show was the development of these tunic shapes as Gerbase later layered different linear fabrications - be it a checked wool or pleated polyester - at stepped lengths, creating silhouettes of tiered, asymmetric, material-blocked dresses. Here, you could also see her link to the work of American abstract painter Agnes Martin, and more specifically the grid configurations of her hand-drawn 'On a Clear Day' series, which led Gerbase to title this collection 'The Matter of Mathematics'.
Photography: Jason Lloyd-Evans
