The Light Touch
Review of Tory Burch Spring 2024 Fashion Show
By Mark Wittmer
THE COLLECTION
THE VIBE
THE THEME
For Spring 2024, Tory Burch took her commitment to designing to serve the needs of sophisticated women in a few new directions, finding a stripped-back new focus on materiality and lightness that lend a subtly retro-futurist flavor to her contemporary take on classic American sportswear. Women’s garment construction techniques historically associated with restriction, like crinolines, boning, and hairnets, are instead put to work in serving the motions of the body, while innovative fabrics similarly opt for lightness and motion.
THE BUZZWORDS
Light. Sleek. Dynamic.
THE SHOWSTOPPER
Look # 32
As she herself mentioned backstage, it’s quite out of character for Tory Burch to opt for short dresses and skirts. But these pieces actually felt like some of the collection’s strongest moments, and the gorgeous layering here provided some visual complexity in a collection that was perhaps almost too stripped-back.
THE DIRECTION
THE QUOTE
Seeking calm and lightness amidst a chaotic world, Tory Burch deployed innovative fabrics and a stripped-back focus to land at an intriguing point that feels retro, yet not connected to a specific past era, futuristic, but not science-fiction. Perhaps that’s just a complicated way of saying “contemporary” – in a present moment when women are rightfully demanding more freedoms than ever, Tory Burch shows them a way of dressing that is liberated but sophisticated.”
THE WRAP UP
Though that ambition doesn’t come together in every look, it’s always exciting to see an established designer with a familiar formula work to break out of their own mold. Here Tory Burch has landed at an interesting point that feels retro, yet not connected to a specific past era, futuristic, but not science-fiction. Perhaps that’s just a complicated way of saying “contemporary” – in a present moment when women are rightfully demanding more freedoms than ever, Tory Burch shows them a way of dressing that is liberated but sophisticated.
