to Cruise or not to Cruise

Every year I promise myself I won't post about Cruise and Pre-Fall collections anymore. And every year I fail. It's not that I actually enjoy them, but I always end up finding something nice about them. It might be because of a kind of eagerness that follows the end of one fashion week season and the anticipation of the next. In any case, Bottega Veneta and Burberry Prorsum have been the only two to join Dior and Chanel in the wonderful world of Cruise 2011 so far. Bottega Veneta pleasantly surprised me with menswear-inspired silhouettes very much in the line of Phoebe Philo. Black and white dominate over the pretty amazing tailoring with the odd dash of bright orange and blue or the more restrained beige. And I was happy to find another of those breath-taking dresses they do sometimes, like the one from FW09 I posted about two years ago.

Burberry Prorsum, with all their talk of heritage and vintage and faded, was almost entirely boring. The colours and the shapes were mostly repetitions of those of either SS10 or FW10 and the belted trench coats never ended. But one thing I did love, the crochet dresses and trench coats. They added a breath of fresh air and showed how the combination of heritage and innovation is feasible.
What do you make of Cruise collections?
I'm off.

[Pictures: Style.com, tforlando.com]