Aleksandar Protic Modalisboa S/S 2013

Just this past week at MODALisboa PULSE, Aleksandar Protic showed his Summer 2013 collection – a ravishing show of warrior elegance and strength in leather, silk, and linen.

Protic drew his inspiration for this show from the Yugoslavian graphic novelist Enki Bilal’s female characters, warriors between the worlds within and without. The silhouette featured drop waists, long skirts, and samurai-esque thick leather belts – accentuating the waist and profile on the runway. All the women wore slicked back hair, their faces sharp and strong while framed by the movable yet architectural structures. Where triangular cuts and folds held the dresses and shirts onto the shoulders, the use of golden and white linen, as well as silk, allowed the fabrics to flow down, creating movement like that of the wind blowing. These outfits would be equally at home on a dusty, windy, sand-covered foreign planet – as well as in a dirty and over-populated futuristic city like L.A. in Blade Runner. But the woman in clothing was always the same, strong, sleek, edgy, modern – a quietly intense warrior.

With fashion everything comes around a second time, reinvented and rethought, and Protic’s collection this spring called across multiple cultures for it’s sleek shapes, fabrics, and concepts. Drawing from all to foresee the future, the collections muted and bright, sharp and flowing selection of outfits showed us both sides of the warrior – the soft that needs the bold.