Zara has revealed its second ever designer collaboration, and as you can expect from the Spanish retail giant, there's an all star cast. The new 25-piece capsule collection is crafted by legendary American designer Narciso Rodriguez, and Zara have tapped up none other than OG supermodel Natalia Vodianova to front the campaign, shot by Craig McDean.
The collection of clothing and accessories in the Narciso Rodriguez x Zara collab are all pieces drawn from his vast archive. Rodriguez's career spans over 30 years, and he remains one of the key figures in the fashion movement of minimalism. His best-known design is still probably the wedding dress he made for his friend Carolyn Bessette Kennedy in 1996. If you look at many of the modern influencers and Scandi tastemakers today, a lot of the clean lines and style cues they are embracing are unwittingly lifted from a page in the Narciso Rodriguez book. Kennedy's slip dress was so ravishingly simple it changed the bridal business and continues to be an icon of modern glamour.
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Natalia Vodianova fronts the campaign
Fans of the dress can rejoice, "There’s a beautiful slip dress in the collection that’s bias-cut and with interesting seaming," Rodriguez explains of the collection, "It’s what people think of when they think of my brand. It’s very liquid. It flows over the body." A 1990s fashion pioneer, what made a Rodriguez dress so revolutionary was not that it was tight-fitting or revealing, but that the body underneath always remained free.
"This has been an amazing experience for me," said Rodriguez of working with Zara in a statement, "It was great to go through the archive and revisit things that we loved. It is also great to see them through Zara ́s design team fresh eyes. They are such a professional team excited about each piece and making sure the essence of the original ones are maintained."
Making clothes has always been deeply personal for Rodriguez, "My strength is my fabrics, my ateliers, my hands," he once said, "Working with Zara is eye-opening, because everyone is so aware of what’s going on in the world and in fashion... They have really enthusiastic, energetic people, and they were excited about every aspect of this collaboration. And that was fun for me—to see people who weren’t around when these clothes were first shown, now celebrating and enjoying them as much as we did 20 years ago."
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The collection retains the brands signature minimalism
Who is Narciso Rodriguez?
The son of Cuban immigrants, whose father was a longshoreman in New Jersey, he graduated from the Parsons School of Design. After working for a number of American and European fashion houses, he opened his own firm in New York City in 1998. He was the first designer to win two consecutive Women’s Designer of the Year awards from the Council of Fashion Designers of America. He created two successful fragrances, Narciso and For Her. His clothes have been worn by some of the world’s most prominent women, including Michelle Obama, Claire Danes and Sarah Jessica Parker.
Narciso Rodriguez x Zara will be available from 8 September 2022 on Zara.com and in selected stores.
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