Purple Fashion
[January 27 2023]
FROLOV HAUTE COUTURE SS23 “THE ISLAND OF LOVE”
In the midst of the nightmare, FROLOV’s creative director Ivan Frolov found the Island of Love. It is dark there. But love is not afraid of the absence of light. Moreover, intimacy and fragility are often born in darkness. So are born FROLOV’s haute couture pieces. Hand-executed with extreme attention to detail and finish. In the center of Kyiv. During frequent blackouts and air raid sirens. Boundaries, body, taboos, and bonds. FROLOV has always been fascinated by human sexuality. This season, the subject of his research is the heritage of Ukrainian sexuality. The brand has been exploring it for a few years by working with ethnographers, historians, and archives. Another inspirational starting point for this collection is Ukrainian television series of the turn of the millennium. The favorite of the brand’s team – “The Island of Love ” – hypnotizes with its aesthetic of reinterpreted Ukrainian folk eroticism. Haute Couture Spring 2023 FROLOV collection absorbs vast ingredients of Ukrainian heritage and collides them in unexpected ways. Among the elements Frolov highlights loose silk sirwals worn by Cossacks in the XV century. Traditional rushnyks’ (‘towels’) symbolism on the white embroidered jumpsuit. Emerald dress inspired by Mavka’s – female spirits who enticed and lured young men into the woods. Eye symbol – as the center of Ukrainian worldview. A bird – as heavenly creator with cosmic scales of activity. And the archives of FROLOV collections, famous for their sexual subtexts. Pieces are hand-embroidered using techniques that were used to decorate the outfits of a Cossack foremans in the XVI century. FROLOV suggests exploring his first Haute Couture collection presented in Paris in an intimate setting of a darkroom. The place where we processed films and made prints of our latest campaign shot in Kyiv. The place which recalls in our mind the power of constructing designs by hand from start to finish. The place – which reminds us of the state of mind of all Ukrainians – darkness where beauty will prevail.
Designer: Ivan Frolov
Photos by Kateryna Mitskevych
