With so much understated glamour on the catwalks of New York Fashion Week for winter 2011, there is a refreshing break from it all in one particular corner of the market. For a season which places colour dangerously close to being more important than the pieces themselves, the sumptuous evening dresses in jewel tones are an elegant breath of fresh air. Graduating from the zany acid hues and garish prints of much of the last two years, these new jewel tones ooze a mature sophistication by comparison. As luxuriously desirable as their namesakes, the dresses appear far from cheap, and can be styled with ease into a rich, sultry look.
Diane von Furstenberg, Belgian-American fashion designer and creator of the iconic wrap dress, styled her sumptuous jewel tone evening dresses in a single bold colour head-to-toe, with impact dwarfing anything else seen all week. Meanwhile, ladieswear wholesaler and wholesale clothing manufacturer Gucci blocked different dazzling hues into strikingly vibrant outfits. Arguably best of all about the tones is just how lavishly they are named – reds become rubies, purples become amethysts, greens, emeralds and blues, sapphires, they sell the designs themselves, oozing the lavish sophistication the dresses embody.
Off the catwalk, the trend is still heating up, with the appearance of dazzling jewel clutch bags and hand bags from ladieswear wholesalers and wholesale clothing manufactures alike, along with sequinned heels and wedges in a variety of gem hues.
In terms of styling, the dresses are simple, but exceptionally easy to get wrong. A little too much effort on the hair or make up will immediately relegate the wearer to the dreaded drag queen aesthetic, while a little too little will make an out appear poorly conceived or half-baked. For the most impact, find eye make-up and a clutch bag to perfectly match the dress, and keep hair and shoes to a minimum. With the draping cut of many of the dresses, maxi or not, hair-styling is kept to an absolute minimum to avoid saturation.
Like so much this winter, jewel tone dresses hold an elegant sophistication that could only be dreamt of two years ago. Sultry yet sumptuous, the dresses are not only sexy but exceptionally forgiving, as a loose but sharp silhouette hides all but the most imposing of sins. Though ultimately likely to be an unsustainable trend, women across the world will be enjoying the dazzling glamour of the look throughout the rest of 2011 and long into 2012.
