The biggest surprise at the Calvin Klein show this afternoon was not the clothes, which were consistently minimal. It was the appearance of three models considered ancient in fashion years: Stella Tennant, Kirsty Hume, and Kristen McMenamy, the latter with a silver-gray ponytail swinging across her back.
These women are not old they are 40, maybe but they are a bit more mature than the average catwalker, and that was exactly right for this collection. Costa’s palette this season is black and white and gray. He worked with molded, rounded shoulders on jackets and coats. Standouts included an ivory shearling coat with a storm flap on its front, and an elegant passage of sheer gossamer dresses.
Since taking the reins at Calvin Klein seven years ago, Costa has honored the house’s commitment to minimalism by designing with clean lines and restrained explorations of color and silhouette. The clothes are not explicitly sexy. They are, instead, serious, and they work most beautifully on adults; on a fresh-faced teenager, they don’t make an enormous amount of sense.
