Sandy Liang has always been for the girls. Whether she’s inspired by Totally Spies! (for her SS25 season), school uniforms or ballet aesthetics, she’s always playing under the theme of girlhood. For her FW25 season? She looked back to her childhood and played dress-up.
In a sea filled with a lot of monochromatic and muted FW25 collections that have stuck to the recessioncore vibes of our times, Liang went against the tides and opted for an optimistic, nostalgic and dopamine-fuelled collection that was straight out of a John Hughes movie, the Polly Pocket version. Liang played with ‘80s and ‘90s fashion: yellow stars, ribbon merit badges, ruffled, puffy pink dresses, metallic skirts and frosty metallic lips were right out of an ‘80s high-school prom; polka dots, midi skirts and suit pants dabbled with officewear; fleece jacket-and-skirt sets brought the girly, sporty vibes. The looks felt like something Deb from Napoleon Dynamite would wear (complimentary), or whatever Romy and Michele have lying around for their high school reunion.
Liang’s collection explored the concept of growing up. In a childhood capsule fantasy that was inspired by ‘90s toys (like Furbies, Tamagotchis and Polly Pockets) and Toys R Us, leggings had polka dots and the hoodies were floral, bags were pencil case-shaped, and printed skirts had scans of Liang’s childhood planner and stills of making an origami, while the soundtrack played “I’m Walking In The Air” from The Snowman and synth-heavy beats. In a Polly Pocket-coded way, skirts had small skirts embroidered on them, dresses had dresses, and tops had tops.
The designer looked into her inner child and merged a childhood nostalgia with her usual feminine, cool NYC-girl aesthetic, in an escapist collection that stayed true to the “lemony garlic miso gochujang brown butter pasta” girlies of the world.
Featured images Sandy Liang©
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