The Tsumori Chisato showroom appointment was more animated than usual, primarily because the Tokyo-based designer was present—a rare occurrence for a non-runway collection. It didn’t hurt that her travel inspo this season was Cuba, which she visited last October. She summed up the experience like this: “Cha cha cha.”
With maracas as her main motif, the clothes took characteristically kooky twists and turns, from rows of the rattles suspended between lace on a shirtdress to embroidered instruments boasting mustaches and lips applied to a natural tweed suit. As a raffia satchel, the visual was smile inducing. Chisato made a wise move by keeping her color palette tight when she could have been otherwise tempted by all those now-cliché Havana hues. A white coatdress with a striped belt that was loosely inspired by student uniforms and the blue gingham pieces with puff sleeves and red and yellow fil coupe accents were two examples of ideas that kept her Latin American source material at a respectable distance. The impression from the off-the-shoulder boardwalk blouses in broderie anglaise and smocked tops layered with flounced knit skirts was one of youthful naïveté, which has always been Chisato’s default register, whether or not it accurately depicts reality. She noted, incidentally, how many of her loyal customers aren’t that young, and she continues to address this with forgiving silhouettes—for every striped tube skirt, there’s a color-blocked tunic and coolly crinkled palazzo pant. Her joie de vivre can come across as simplistic, but she’s not out of touch.
