British womenswear brand The Fold, known for its luxury tailoring and workwear collections, has launched a collaboration with botanical artist Rosie Sanders as it continues to grow its occasionwear offering.
The limited-edition seven-piece capsule collection includes statement floral occasion looks, including dresses, separates and tailoring, featuring peonies and roses printed on luxurious silk and premium stretch cotton.
Celebrated for her expressive watercolour paintings of flowers, British artist Sanders is recognised as one of the most prominent botanical artists of her generation and her work has been exhibited internationally.
Commenting on the inspiration behind her work, Sanders told FashionUnited: “I’ve always loved macro photography; concentrating and enlarging something that’s fairly small into something larger and having a different scale. You know, if you were an ant or something, it would look absolutely enormous, wouldn’t it? So, it’s getting into another world, I suppose. And, well, I’ve always loved flowers.
“For the last 20 years or so, my paintings are more to do with shape and colour, so I use flowers because they have such a wide variety of form and colour and texture. But what I’m looking at really is not the flower; I’m looking at the shapes, the colours, and the play of light – that’s what excites me. It’s not ‘oh, I want to paint a camellia’, I look at something in the garden and it’s the way the light is coming through it or playing on it that excites me really. And it happens to be flowers, but I wouldn’t say it is necessarily flowers.”
The Fold creates ‘wearable art’ occasionwear with botanical artist Rosie Sanders
Sanders has taken her love of botanicals and created exclusive large-scale peonies and roses, which have been transformed onto The Fold’s signature tailoring and occasionwear, such as the brand’s Knighton jacket that has been reimagined in a fully lined heavyweight silk crepe de chine with the watercolour floral placement print strategically positioned on the jacket in-house for maximum impact, which sees blue peonies enlarged to an abstract effect. The look comes with coordinating Adelaide trousers for the ultimate head-to-toe look.
On why she chose peonies and roses for the collection, Sanders added: “For me, it’s all about the shape and the colours they make, and roses are particularly good at that because they go slightly eccentric when they’re beginning to fall apart, and I love that.
“I love flowers, but I don’t necessarily want to paint them all; it’s mostly been roses and peonies and tulips and things that have a certain amount of presence. For the big paintings, it’s got to be something with some presence or dynamism about it.”
Other highlights from the collections include the delicate yellow silk chiffon dress with a detailed rose watercolour print, The Fold’s bestselling Kelmore skirt and matching Skye top reimagined with striking peonies, and a maxi dress cut from premium Italian cotton with a watercolour floral painting in tones of blue and orange.
Katya Maschenko, design director at The Fold, added: “The scale of Rosie’s paintings pick up the imperfections of petals which inspired us to use large, almost abstract placement across our designs. Even when blown up, the details aren’t lost, which is a testament to the intricacies of the paintings.”
The Fold x Rosie Sanders collection is available via the brand’s website, with prices ranging from 295 to 650 pounds.
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