One of the more unlikely motifs to come out of the spring 2021 collections was the blob. Shoulders and sleeves were inflated like birthday balloons, and taffeta blossomed out from the hips and waist in many different collections. I like to think of these blobs as forgiveness for our pandemic slacking, a reshaping of our bodies to reflect the readjustments of the world. Pumping up volumes has been a Rejina Pyo signature since her first runway show almost four years ago, but for spring 2021 there’s a slight strangeness to her padded thong sandals and the almost pannier-like halter dress that closes out her lookbook. Strange is good.
Over a video call from her studio, Pyo said she started working on her new collection thinking about the beach. She spent the early days of the pandemic in Korea with her parents and family, making time to drive her three-year old son to the beach each weekend. Childlike seashell and seahorse prints appear on loose camp shirts and board shorts. To complement them, Pyo is launching her first range of swimwear, clay-colored one pieces with adjustable straps and a tiny banana yellow bandeau top. They are feminine, but not saccharine—like the other pieces here.
Pyo names a lemon-lime halter dress with oval keyholes as her favorite piece, smirking as she suggests that it would be better with the cutouts running the entire length of the dress rather than just at the top. Elsewhere, Pyo offers a plasticy pink skirt ruched into a sort of bubble wrap; the same color appears as lean trousers with a loose tie around the waist. Papery linen and starchy cottons lends a pastoral, hand-done look to some of Pyo’s popular separates and suits, while a sheer skirt with a giant taffeta ruffle at the bottom delivers a cloudlike bit of flou. The closing look of the collection is a backless halter with jaunty pannier hips. Pyo’s blobs are sensual over sexual, and cerebral over commonplace. This is a beachy, of-the-earth collection that only a woman could design for other women.