Issue link: https://www.balharbourdigital.com/i/780216
This is a moment to make a statement. With a president live Tweeting his every waking thought and a 24-hour news cycle invariably refreshing headlines, broadcasting ideals is par for the course. It certainly seeped onto the Spring 2017 runways, where the prescriptions for this season involved wearing slogans on your t-shirt, power clashing your patterns, and making like Coco Chanel and grabbing "a handful of jewels to brighten up the moment." Her fashion house, helmed by Karl Lagerfeld, imagined a future in which AI is your fashionable friend and dressing is best finished by absentmindedly tossing on a single exaggerated enamel stud or hulking Byzantine cross as an afterthought before heading out of the door. If nothing else, the sculptural jewelry, when worn together, alone, or as was the case on runways from New York to Paris, entirely mismatched is certainly a coy route to finding your audience ("Excuse me, miss, you dropped an earring…"). The mood-lifting power of a major set of earrings first gained traction in New York, where it had everyone from Rodarte to Proenza Schouler lending an ear. You'd be forgiven for forgetting what Kate and Laura Mulleavy designed below neck after they paired sweeping romantic ear cuffs with drips of chains, metallic loops, and teardrop gems, occasionally tying the two together with a connecting string of baubles that hung below the chin like an anti-gravitational necklace. By the time the trend crossed the pond to London, it took on a playful wink. Simone Rocha produced sartorial-caused serotonin topping her trench coats and loosely fitted lace dresses with mad dashes of red lipstick and splashes of mismatched earrings: one a crystal drop, one a golf ball- sized pearl. In Milan, the Gucci girl was waving her maximalist flag ever higher, accessorizing like her life depended on it. There were silk embroidered wide brimmed hats, studded lapels, bedazzled glasses, a rainbow of pussybows, and rhinestone encrusted earrings extending from lobe to collarbone. And, taking a final victory lap in Paris, earrings had grown so over-the-top that Humberto Leon and Carol Lim decided to anchor Kenzo's baubles at the top of the ear rather than allow the oversize crystal clusters to pull the models' ears down low. Because staying quiet in noisy times is an affront to democracy, instead make a statement all the way up to your earrings. 50 BAL HARBOUR Details from the Gucci Spring Summer 2017 collection Bold, mismatched earrings make a statement BY MACKENZIE WAGONER Hear, Hear