Raquel Allegra

It's rare that you hear designers profess Pre-Fall to be their favorite season. Deliveries hit at such a time as to prove puzzling: Should it be a lineup of summery dresses or cocoon coats? A mix of both? Raquel Allegra, who did in fact declare Pre-Fall her preferred season, didn't get bogged down in that kind of minutiae. Chalk it up in part to the somewhat "seasonless" quality of the designer's clothes, created as they are with an eye to inventive layering: a mini-dress over a slip, over a skirt, over pants. Top it all off with a slouchy blazer and bask in an overall feeling of effortless cool.

Not typically one for themed collections, Allegra did embrace a central motif here: the dashiki. That reference, sprung originally from the vintage shops of her native Berkeley, California, dates back to her earliest experiments in design almost a decade ago. This time, her dashiki patterns came to life printed atop chiffon mini-dresses and even a sweatshirt - though those punchy, more graphic pieces found a contrast in a series of pretty pastel watercolor silks, like a dress in whisper-soft pink and spring green.

Process is central to Allegra's work; the hand is evident in most of her clothes, be it the irregularities in pigment or the slightly raised quality where color gathers around string during tie-dyeing. Here, she explored the possibilities of using one technique and color story across fabrications. Charmeuse, for example, resists dye, while chiffon fairly eats it up. Per Allegra: "It allows me to have a romance with each piece" - the designer, certainly, and her customer, too.

(www.vogue.com)