Anna Sui Does Impressionism Her Way for Resort 2024

Anna Sui says she doesn't have a favorite period in art history, but for Resort 2024, she leaned on impressionism and its modern descendants as an inspiration, fitting a collection that explores lust and human nature.

Vincent van Gogh and Pierre-Auguste Renoir may be some of the most well-known artists of this genre, but Sui's more interested in "today's impressionism," which uses multiple-exposure photography and digital printing to create ethereal imagery. She had Mary Cassatt (whose art reminds Sui of Claude Monet's water lilies) and Berthe Morisot on the mood board for Resort 2024, and collaborated with visual artist Danielle Winter to translate her butterfly print onto multiple pieces. ("[It's] really magical-looking," she says, "as much as Degas' ballet dancers are.")

The soft colors and illusory style of impressionism are a vehicle for her message this season: Dream vividly again.

"There's a beautiful world out there, and that's really what I'm trying to express," she says. "I like the chalkiness of all the impressionist painters, so I was trying to capture that. I also like the fuzziness — there's nothing clear-cut about it."

Resort 2024 is imbued with the traits of the style. From far away, certain fabrics look like the summer sky dabbled with clouds, while some are veiled by a top coat of silver that gives them an "iridescence and "magical haze," according to Sui. (Silvery makeup looks, created with Pat McGrath, are a direct reference to the beauty from her Spring 1994 collection.) The collection is whimsical and optimistic, filled with playful, lacy slips; bright satins; feather-hemmed sequin dresses; and patched-up Levi's 501 jeans.

Sui's collections aren't devoid of color, but they do tend to stick to a darker palette. "I don't usually work in pastels — I don't think I've done this much pastel in a long time," she says. But this was the best way to capture the spirit of the line: "I love to transport my customer. I love to make them dream. That's really important now, especially for this younger generation: They need to learn how to dream and dream about beautiful things, not like all the bad that's been going on."

The clothes tell a story about human nature, of the feelings of wanting and lust that are wrapped up in it, and how these are enmeshed in how fashion is consumed.

"There's been like a seismic shift... not only for how clothes are worn, but also how they're bought, how they're sold," she says. "It used to be that you needed to digest what was new. You'd see something and maybe you wouldn't even like it at first, but then you would see somebody wearing it and then suddenly thought, 'Oh, I've gotta get that.' I think it's human nature... We're not giving ourselves that opportunity. Everything is new, new, new."

"We have to dream. We have to desire. We have to lust," she continues. "We can't just be complacent or just want what everybody else has or what everybody else is doing. You have to take it beyond that. And I think that that's so important."

See the full Anna Sui Resort 2024 collection below.

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