Tommy Dorfman may be the girl who didn’t go to Paris in Hillary Taymour’s sendup of aughts reality TV “The Collinas,” but she is absolutely the girl who stole the show at New York Fashion Week. As a Lauren Conrad wannabe, Dorfman gets an internship at Collina Strada and fumbles the bag—all while carrying Collina’s new deadstock raffia tote. She is shamed by her peers for eating a meat-based sandwich, taking too many selfies, being bad at steaming trousers, and drinking from a disposable cup. Her performance is spot on—self-serious, absent-minded, earnest, and heavily reliant on vocal fry—and left the audience inside the Angelika Theater cheering for more. (A sequel, “The Stradas” please?) Dorfman’s star turn was complemented by a large supporting cast, Rowan Blanchard, Francesco Risso, Chloe Wise, Lynette Nylander, Jazzelle Zanaughtti, Ruby Aldridge, and Vogue’s own Liana Satenstein among them. Angel Prost, designer Hillary Taymour’s partner, provided the soundtrack via their band Frost Children.
The short film is the latest in Taymour’s pandemic wins. (Remember her video game, her animorphs, her rooftop farmstand show?) It illustrated, with a heaping spoonful of love, how ditsy and stupid and airless fashion can be.
The irony, or maybe the genius, of it is that Taymour’s fashion is never stupid or airless. She is quietly thoughtful, making garments that flatter all bodies and all ways of life. Her well-executed projects, effectively seamless in their execution, may actually draw some attention away from the strength of her clothing, which, for fall 2022, looks better than ever.
This season, she’s entered her ’00s phase, with pleated skirt belts that drip off the hips of many looks and low-rise cargo pants and shorts. Some ideas from spring 2022 carry over, like the Angel-printed tee and meshy layering pieces that have long been a staple. Crushed velvet puff jackets stuffed with flower down are new, made with zebra stripe or star seaming. “It is actually so warm,” affirmed Charlie Engman’s mother Kathleen, who appears in the lookbook and film. There is a low vibrating cake theme as well—Zanaughtti poses in a pageant ribbon top holding a pink cake; a pair of jeans were dyed using melted sprinkles. Chiffon is shredded to evoke feathers and studio detritus is cut into fringe. The eclecticism of Taymour’s earliest collections persists, but here are dozens of wearable wantable garments presented in a lovable laughable way. Proof that being the girl who went to Paris isn’t all it’s cracked up to be. We have great thought leaders right here in New York.
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