Over Zoom from China and Australia, Ph5’s Wei Lin and Zoe Champion described their spring 2022 lookbook as a love letter to New York. Though Lin and Champion have been grounded across the world, they (and their team) still call New York City home. “We took it back to New York and we worked with five amazing women from our community, women who have championed us behind the scenes,” Champion said. “Wei and I couldn’t be there physically, but we could be there digitally.”
Zenat Begum of Playground Coffee Shop and Annex; creative editor Danielle Combs; multimedia artist D’Ana Nunez; art director Gia Seo; and Jess Tran of Scallion Pancake star in the latest Ph5 offerings, pictured alongside the homesteading-lite activities that have given them peace during the pandemic, from baking to gardening to building Lego. Lin and Champion threaded (no pun intended) the same kinds of activities through the clothes, referencing tie-dyeing and crochet in a distinctly PH5 way. This is a brand which, just last season, created a fabric that changes color when exposed to UV light, so even these more artisanal details have a level of techy surreality to them. The tie-dye is created digitally on a grid rather than actually dyeing the garment, for instance.
The color palette would make Hanna-Barbera proud; shades of chartreuse, camel, coral, cobalt, and hot pink zing off the pages of the lookbook. Sometimes the cartooniness is underscored by the aforementioned Lego, or, in one instance, a landline phone in the likeness of Garfield. PH5’s signature wavy dress (a body-conscious, knit dress with an asymmetrical, scalloped hem) is done up in pink tie-dye, turquoise rib knit, and a solid navy with a tie-dye border that, from a distance, looks like a textured appliqué rather than a print.
While known for their tight-fitting, technical knits, this season Champion and Lin experimented with making clothing that deliberately hangs away from the body, or at least does not constrict it. They crafted a pleated A-line skirt, as well as plenty of sports bra-like tops for those women who emerge from lockdown and vow never to wear an underwire again. Even so, these are hardly clothes to lounge around the house or garden in. Much like Champion and Lin, they deserve to be out and about in New York, reveling in all its vibrancy.
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