While Prisca Vera Franchetti was in the early stages of putting together her new spring collection, the designer went trim shopping and took her baby daughter and a friend’s toddler along. “They were so excited, and kept opening all of the drawers,” said Franchetti. That sense of wonderment and discovery, around something as simple as buttons, ended up totally changing the direction of her line: Franchetti reminded herself to have fun with her fashion choices. “I romanticized it a little bit, and thought of design from a child’s perspective,” she said.
Of course, Priscavera has never been without its heavy dose of fun: The label specializes in sexy going-out attire, and doesn’t take itself too seriously. But this season Franchetti wanted to lean in further toward a sense of play and discovery. That resulted in pieces like a silk-chiffon dress in baby blue, featuring an open back punctuated with black leather straps with grommets. (Very Y2K-adjacent.) Her white wide-leg jeans and bikini bra tops came with multicolored crystal embellishments—as though a young child had gotten hold of a Bedazzler and gone wild.
While these leaned teenybopper, there were also more refined approaches to channeling a youthful spirit. Franchetti designed knit tank tops and dresses, for example, that had a metallic sheen to them—the perfect mix of timeless yet irreverent. Her take on a businessy pinstripe suit was a tight pencil skirt with a strappy semisheer pinstripe bra top to match. Sportier, meanwhile, was the butter yellow nylon-shorts tracksuit, for when her party-girl customer needs a day off.
