RUNWAY: Walter Van Beirendonck SS12

Often called a "fashion renegade", Walter Van Beirendonck's collections are always worth mentioning. For Spring/Summer 2012, the Belgian designer showed a flurry of soft pastel-hued suits and suit separates. The unusually understated collection had 1950s influences, a la Ward Cleaver, as well as some tribal references, mostly in the body paint and tricep-length gloves. Though the show started as a quiet collection, for Beirendonck's standard, ended with an amazing feat of ingenuity in the form of bulbous tulle outfits in candy colors from lemon to orange to sour apple.