Rudsak - spring/summer 2005
Banana yellow and lime green, colours that threaten to drown all others this season with its unrelenting optimism, is used on more than one skimpy leather skirt, as well as on high-waisted leather jackets. Who said that shoulder pads went out with the nineteen-eighties? Despite this glam-central appeal–and in my argument I cite the proliferation of silver zippers and snaps–the streamlining prevents anything in the collection from being as kitchy as the decade that it conjures up. Rudsak uses stretch-wool detailing on these spring jackets, something they would normally reserve for aviators, yet it works just as well.
Innovations like the slit shoulder is new for Rudsak, but they do rely, to their credit, on some of their market-tested favourites. Can you really ever go wrong with low-slung treated leather pants, especially ones that flare at just the right spot? These flares creep into some of the shark fin collars, as does the two-tone trim that cropped up in several previous Rudsak collections.
I don’t care too much for the floral pants for men, but the bone-white linen suits are just unkempt enough to be cool. It looks like many of the men’s clothes mirror the selections for women, just with a boxier cut and maybe slightly less embellishment. But it’s once again the leather pants, this time stark white, that save the day for Rudsak.
Daniel Cox, Fashion Editor
Marek Wlazlo, Photographer
