Freedom Fighters

May 4th, 2012

Rusk’s Sandra Yu gives gals plenty of ammo with retro ringlets on the Jeremy Scott runway.

Designer: Jeremy Scott

Products: Rusk

Stirring up controversy is nothing new for avant-garde designer Jeremy Scott, and the current tumultuous political climate provides enough fodder for him to go hog wild. Poking fun at the Bush administration’s “War on Terror” tactics and diplomacy, Scott marches out an in-your-face collection that merges hypocrisy with fashion. Some references are literal, such as barbed wire and Uzi submachine gun prints, gun ammo slung across chests, and a bustier boasting the nation’s Capitol as its ample cups. Satire also comes into play with Care Bears wielding machine guns and army helmets with Mickey Mouse ears.

While the topic is somber, the beauty and hair that pair with such antiwar jesting comes in the form of chic war paint and retrofitted ringlets, courtesy of Rusk artistic director Sandra Yu.

“Jeremy wanted a ringlet look—very vintage!” says Yu. “But, the challenge became modernizing the style to coincide with his very forward-thinking collection, yet still keeping that retro feeling in the hair.”

To fast-forward this old-world style to 2007, Yu works the hair into innocent, glossy ringlets and incorporates a fringe extension that she cut to a blunt edge for most of the models. For Yu, the juxtaposition of pacifist girly-girl and gun-toting warmonger makes perfect sense. “I love how the youthful sweetness of the hair blends with the edginess of the collection,” she says.