St. John Resort 2022

St. John creative director Zoe Turner is on a roll.

In less than two years, the British-born knitwear specialist, whose CV includes stints at Max Mara, Alberta Ferretti, Dior under John Galliano and Raf Simons, has given the sleepy SoCal tweed suit brand real fashion currency.

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Bra tops and bike shorts from St. John? You betcha. For resort, Turner pushed the idea of more casual separates in the luxe house tweeds, adding stretch to create body-con sizzle with a side of 1980s/’90s nostalgia.

“As much as it’s about celebrating our loyal customer, it’s about welcoming the new as well,” said Turner, describing the collection as being about freedom, movement and positive energy.

St. John has already garnered the attention of celebs, even during the pandemic, with Alicia Keys, Ruby Rose and Busy Philipps recently wearing the label. And resort’s sandy tweed bodysuit with gold buttons should be a Hollywood and editorial star. (There are other versions in the collection without the hardware that can be layered under cropped jackets and worn with jeans.)

Working in a coastal palette, and adding shine in the form of iridescent tweed foil and sequin finishes on cropped jackets, miniskirts and five-pocket jean silhouettes, Turner upped both the accessibility and wow factors with this collection.

She updated stiff ’80s and ’90s stalwarts such as the ladylike coat dress, making it chic for today in soft, stretchy beige tweed with gold buttons, and reworked the tweed jacket into a cropped wrap blazer styled over stretch tweed leggings. An orange melange tweed catsuit looked fresh matched to a four-pocket jacket. Another riff on a suit came in confetti boucle with biker shorts.

Wool suiting in baby blue, blush pink, creamsicle and sunshine yellow had a Cher Horowitz appeal, with cropped jackets, bra tops and minis.

Turner also put more of a focus on evening separates for both new and loyal customers, including edgier-looking black sequin tweed five-pocket pants worn with a cropped jacket, as well as a cream viscose coat and dress ensemble with two tone sequin wave embroidery. Special-looking sculpted gold buttons and cutaway white leather low-heeled sandals added to the feeling of clean, modern elegance.

With the buzz officially on, now it’s up to St. John parent Fosun to get the collection into closets.

Launch Gallery: St. John Resort 2022

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