On a recent Sunday, the garden of the NYC hotspot Saturdays was the low-key setting for Henry Zankov’s spring collection presentation. Among the models wearing his colorful knits were throngs of friends, well-wishers, and department store buyers excited to greet the designer. It felt like a late-summer party with friends.
Founded in 2019, Zankov is known for its graphic sweaters in bold color combinations and easy-to wear silhouettes, that the designer has been slowly building upon and expanding season after season. He seemed most excited about a collaboration with his friend, the painter Philippine de Richemont. Zankov took de Richemont’s gestural paintings of “the human non-gender form,” and transformed them into a pattern that appeared in an easy yellow dress made from a high-twist cotton fabric with a light weight perfect for summer. De Richemont’s faces also appeared as embroidery on a couple of woven button down shirts, done in colorful yarns. “People keep asking about [expanding our categories]. Last season I started experimenting with woven material, and this season we wanted something a bit more hand done,” Zantov said. Also new was a great pair of wide-leg chinos.
Zankov was inspired by Ukrainian Jewish artists who share his heritage, like Sonia Delaunay, Louise Nevelson, Kazimir Malevich, and Aleksei Kruchenykh. “I never want to be literal; instead I pulled from what’s inspiring about the visual language of each artist,” he said. That resulted in a fantastic geometric pattern done in shades of aquamarine and indigo which was digitally printed on a very fine rib, and turned into a swingy button down shirt and skirt.
“I want everything to feel really, really light but also be strong visually,” said Zankov. A knit tank and matching long shorts in an orange terry with thin red and white stripes achieved that goal, as did a horizontal short sleeve top with a zipper at the neck and banded sleeves in shades of bright green, canary yellow, orchid, black, and white. Zankov’s signature blocks of color appeared on an oversized sweater, a pair of shorts, and a short sleeve maxi dress whose secret seemed to lie in the orchid color that appeared on half the ribbed neckline. “I know the color’s right when it feels joyful,” he said, and there was no shortage of joy to be found in this collection. Zankov is certainly one to watch.
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