“The work is about rites of passage, of time and age, and the simple realization that we are always alone,” said Tracey Emin of her exhibition, “The Last Great Adventure is You,” shown at London’s White Cube gallery last fall. The show, and the contemplation of “the ephemeral state and continual flux of a woman’s life,” served as inspiration for Misha Nonoo’s fall/winter 2015 collection.
That contemplation comes through in a poignant mix of structure and skin, comfort and tailoring, vulnerability and strength. The palette features navy blue, grey, silver, scarlet, black, and white. Shoulders are bare, or bold and padded, and the décolletage is either coyly concealed with turtlenecks and collars, or exposed with a deep V. A print of squiggly lines that conjures Emin’s expressive, gestural drawings of the female form adorn a series of grey and black garments, which are some of the best in the collection.
Misha Nonoo fall/winter 2015
Particularly strong is a structured wool sheath with a square, sleeveless neckline worn over a sheer black turtleneck with the same squiggly motif in silver beading. It seems the embodiment of contemporary womanhood as many experience it. Nonoo’s modern woman has many conflicting, often constricting manifestations–strength, professionalism, delicacy, vulnerability–which she balances with grace and style.
