LAFAYETTE 148 NEW YORK RESORT 2023

With Lafayette 148’s Resort 2023 collection, creative director Emily Smith serenely explores the endless possibilities of the seasonal wardrobe from her atelier at the heart of the Brooklyn Naval Yard. Confidently riffing on the aesthetic and stylistic hallmarks of the 1990s – the time and place that birthed the Lafayette 148 brand – the collection sees Smith establish her coolly precise vision for the brand’s modern iteration.

Along with her Lafayette 148 atelier team, Emily Smith has spent years fine-tuning a collective knowledge and expertise in tailoring. Her creative ambition is defined by a restless pursuit of excellence: to craft a sophisticated feminine wardrobe from the highest-quality fabrics, in doing so becoming a seasonal staple for the women who come to the brand for its immaculate cuts and flawless quality. For Resort, Smith and her atelier team have evolved these staples further, pushing the silhouettes into newly sculptural volumes, progressive textile collages and thoroughly modern takes on colour-blocking and layered styling. The result sees the projection of the House’s signature design codes – immaculate tailoring, architectural lines, elevated workwear, and maritime stripes – into vibrant expressions of cool-girl classics in a Pop Art palette.

Workwear and poplin shirting are presented in extravagantly collaged textures. Masculine wool-linen Italian tailoring is transformed into sun-saturated shades. Pops of colour are added to occasion gowns, and wedged heels are playfully introducing in fuzzy, primary colours, which, in addition to jet-black neoprene platform slides, make them the statement footwear for the new season; accompanied by the latest Lafayette 148 icon accessory – the 8-Knot Hobo bag, featured in finest golden yellow suede.

Founded on Lafayette Street in 1996, Lafayette 148’s upgrade and relocation in 2018 to a loft space in the Brooklyn Navy Yard has brought Smith’s long-held fascination with construction details of American Naval uniform much closer to home. As befits the Resort season, there is an abundance of these uniform references cross the collection. Elevated beyond the vintage source material, the low-rise jeans are presented in raw indigo denim. Flashes of Breton stripes are delivered in richly knitted cashmere silks. And the rich sheen of gold buttons brings an opulence to the collection’s exquisite, super-light napa jackets.

Elsewhere in the season’s collection look book, iconic model Tasha Tilberg is styled in a sporty but chic balaclava and crystalline Fair Isle sweater. Both are nods to the forthcoming Aspen 148 alpine and ski capsule collection. Paired with a ball gown, in one single look Smith demonstrates the effortless breadth of the brand, confidently contemporizing its 1990s codes for the modern woman.