“Picture it: Santorini springtime, early evening: Christian Cota steps outside to take in the sunset. Along the islands’ cliffs, the city gleams white and shining. Soon though, a new city emerges in its place—this one painted orange, then pink, then pinker by the sinking sun. At last, settling twilight bathes the city in purple hues. Mr. Cota, a painter before he ever designed a dress, knows he’s found his subject for Spring 2009: Light.” And so began the inspiration and program notes for Christian Cota’s Spring 2009 Collection.

On a warm, beautiful, sunny day, at Chelsea’s Altman Building, it felt as though the young designer had somehow bottled all those dreamy sunset and twilight colors and released them throughout the downtown showroom. His creations popped against the stark white backdrop, while the 25 models posed on an elevated platform in a human gradient of color along the wall from the warmest yellows and oranges only to explode in cooler hues of blue and purple. While the hauntingly romantic “Moments in Love” by The Art of Noise played overhead, I couldn’t help but notice the shimmer affect given to his lovely gowns, whether with iridescent silks, mesh organza, or metallic linens. Mr. Cota had more than a few tricks up his designing sleeve to personify his sparkling sartorial sunset. From ruffling, draping and pleating techniques to ombré shading, digital printing, metal chain, and beaded overlays; his design details gave the collection a sublime affect, like painting a portrait of light dancing off the sea.  

According to the company website, Christian Cota put on his first fashion shows long before he had ever thought about becoming a designer. “My mother and grandmother would have me put on shows,” Mr. Cota recalls of his childhood in Mexico. “They were my first muses. They were an education in elegance. The way they dressed, the way they carried themselves; they defined the word.”

The budding designer looked for elegance not only in clothes, but anywhere and everywhere it could be found. There was elegance, he discovered, in the coral reefs he explored vacationing with his parents; elegance in the sinew of the horses he rode as a competitive equestrian; and of course, there was elegance in the soignée crowds his family traveled in. From youth, Christian Cota trained his eye on those women who never left the house looking less than chic. His path was set.

Prior to embarking on his career in fashion, Mr. Cota spent time in Paris, where he studied painting. And as he began his formal fashion training as the Parsons School of Design in New York City, he applied his painterly eye to the canvas of clothes, evolving the subtle dynamism of palette found in his work today. At Parsons too, and then later as an assistant to eveningwear designer Angel Sanchez, Christian Cota cultivated his passion for fabric, embracing the discipline of fabric development and making a specialty of innovative hand-embroideries before launching his eponymous line in 2007.

Given his artistic training, it follows suit that the young designer also cited one of Pierre-Auguste Renoir’s works as a source of inspiration. Drawing on the work of Renoir, in particular, his 1888 painting “The Daughters of Catulle Mendes”, which celebrates life’s temporal pleasures—the here and now, much like a sunset with nuances of light and shadow—Mr. Cota has created a collection that paints light with fabric. Draped silhouettes and Fortuny pleating summon shadows; a sunset palette channels and dapples light through color.

“There’s no black in this collection,” noted Mr. Cota. “If you look at Renoir’s work, all the shadow comes from playing colors against each other, so I worked with print and embellishment and draping and layering to suggest the way the light shifts on objects, transforming them. Light is never just light,” he adds. “It’s impression. It’s illusion.”

Illusory affects multiply throughout the collection, which is broken up into three vignettes. The femininity expressed across the collection’s silhouettes ranged from Grecian with draped sleeves and shoulders to more dramatized ruffles, pleats, tucks, and folds, all with a painter’s eye for subtle detail. The iridescent fabrics helped to illustrate the theme of light; playing off sunlight and how light manipulates color as Renoir had done in his paintings, casting shadows with a talent for draping and brilliant use of color. One group is comprised of pieces in whites, ivories, and washed-out pastels; while a second vignette opens into warm corals, oranges, and pinks. The final section cools into blues and dusky violets, shot through with a last hot blast of cerise. Ombre is employed throughout, frequently integrated into the pattern of a blouse or dress, and sometimes hand-painted onto the garment. Crystal and metallic elements add serpentine movement to the clothes already fluidly wrapped against the body’s curves.

“In the end,” the designer continues, “I see this collection as a love story about light, fabric, and a woman’s body. My girl is Eve, being seduced by the light, and turning all colors…”

My favorite looks from the Christian Cota Spring 2009 Collection included: the sublime tangerine strapless beaded overlay dress; the sunshine yellow iridescent silk chiffon one-shoulder draped gown; the stunning mesh organza appliqué blouse with a silk-blend pleated detail pencil skirt; the lavender iridescent silk chiffon draped sleeveless blouse with silk tapered pant; the lovely digital printed sleeveless blouse with a silk taffeta draped-front pencil skirt; and the gorgeous lavender iridescent silk chiffon strapless draped dress with an asymmetrical hem.

Taking inspiration from natural elements often provides the greatest source of inspiration, because they are consistently pure, not partial to socio-economic climate shifts. And while there was a very strong influence of politics, with this year’s presidential election; athletics, on the heels of the XXIX Olympiad Summer Games in Beijing; and economy, with fledgling investors, a beleaguered and overleveraged housing market, bank mergers and takeovers this season; many collections were still inspired by more romantic themes, mainly elements found in nature—water, sun, flowers, butterflies.

This collection was thematic and theatrical, but not of the flashy production milieu; here the beauty of these clothes stood out all on their own. I remember once a friend pointing out how beautiful the sunset was to me, I replied isn’t that redundant. Has anyone ever seen an unattractive sunset? Okay some are certainly more spectacular than others, especially looking out on a clear day as the sun sinks into the Aegean Sea off the coast of the Greek volcanic islands of Santorini, but part of what makes a sunset so beautiful is the natural spectrum of colors, the pinks and yellows blending into the blues and purples, casting a poignant hue. There is something so calming and soothing about watching the sun sink into the horizon. And of course no one sunset is like any other. Anyone who has never watched the sun set and the moon rise is missing one of nature’s greatest gifts.

It’s no wonder that Mr. Cota was inspired by the beautiful islands. From that volcanic eruption, beauty exploded and emerged as dramatically as the colors, embroideries, and pleats do in his new collection. Just looking at photos of Santorini, you can see where the designer draws his color palette; clear blue lagoons, blue-domed cupola churches, and a vivid sky that that serves as the canvas to the yellow that blends with the pink before turning orange, which then melds with blue only to turn purple…

A special note of thanks to Kimberly Flaster of Linda Gaunt Communications

For additional information, please visit http://christiancota.com/

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