I received an email from designer, TÔ Long-Nam. Of all the information I’ve received from designers over the years here, this was the best crafted email I’ve read. I appreciated the attention the detail and biographical information immensely.

He was born in Viêtnam, grew up in Munich and went to school at the Academy of Fine Arts Berlin-Weissensee in Fashion-Design. Long-Nam worked with famous stylists Victoria Bartett and Patti Wilson. His forey into fashion design started as a design assistant for Lanvin menswear.

Positive encouragement after participating in the 21st International Fashion Competition prompted him to start his own line. He has also collaborated with designer Alessandra Facchinetti while she was at Valentino. While working on the Spring 2010 collection he is working for Superfine London, a denim company I’m very fond of.

All this information was great, but I would have been sold at the photos. Long-Nam says this about his Fall 2009 – 2010 collection:

Force has always been a keyword in the design principles of TÔ Long-Nam. For Fall/Winter 2009 the collection found inspiration in the human body and, in particular, the intricacy of the muscles within human anatomy. The soft architectural structure of each muscle, their unique composition, their diversity and their ability to function harmoniously to produce graceful motion formed the foundations of the collection. Based on this understanding, the collection shows a variety of garment constructions borrowing from the gentle and elegant contours of muscle design. Curved seams, round finishings and tactile fabrics united with female proportions delivers a collection which is powerful and modern, but which remains forever feminine at its core.

As the owner of an Honours B.Sc in Kinesology, the muscular aspect of the collection is very appealing to me. I like the way those images have been incorporated into the clothing. The clothing has some masculine qualities that I like.

The collection boasts an array of constructed signature jackets whose architectural designs are executed with an attention to detail that exposes an innate understanding of couture. The essence of the design remain in its transversality. They were designed for any kind of woman, for a maximum number of situations, both work and play, which increasingly seem to be performed in the same outfits. The jackets are cut with a discreet fitted waist to accentuate the female form. The round shapes of the seams follow the female morphology while the back panelling displays the collection’s aesthetical translation of muscle design to fashion design. The jackets employ the use of different fabrics to reflect the diversity of muscle fibres. These materials have been chosen for their varying degress of tactility. The collection uses a mixture of luxurious fabrics to offer a variation of black color shades such as: perforated silk satin, silk satin, cashmere/wool blend, a wool gabardine blend with a silky finishing and a lacqued crêpe de chine. Soft fabrics are combined with raw ones and matt fabrics with shiny ones, in order to sharpen the harmonic contrast between the arrangement of straight lines and round curves.

When I got home I decided to do some googling and discovered that TÔ Long-Nam is carried by Holt Renfrew. The Spring 2009 collection is in the store. His name is absent from the designer list for Fall 2009. I will be keeping my eye out for TÔ Long-Nam’s Spring 2010 collection.

images: courtesy of TÔ Long-Nam