Miami’s own swimwear brand Luli Fama is a perennial favorite during Mercedes-Benz Fashion Week. And, in a nod to its fun, sexy and stylish hometown, “Miami Nice,” Luli Fama’s 2015 collection, was a celebration of the exuberance and high spirits of Miami. “It’s about the city of Miami,” said Lourdes “Luli” Hanimian, one half of the creative team behind the celebrity-fave swimwear brand along with her brother-in-law Augusto Hanimian. “I grew up in Miami and later Augusto came to Miami. We’ve seen the transition from the 70s and 80s to what Miami is today and wanted to celebrate that.” Capturing the vibrance of the city, the show opened with performance artists on stilts and dancers all in costume as exotic flamingos complete with quintessential Miami-vibe pink and orange feathery headdresses and cascading boas.
The collection was signature Luli Fama in a palette of tropical colors including coral, turquoise, ocean blue, and colorful prints. Designs ranged from the teeniest little multi-stringed bikini to a halter jumpsuit in a vibrant coral and turquoise print, to a sexy black fishnet cover-up over a skimpy glamorous black bikini to caftans. Crocheted details were seen on swimwear throughout the show along with a crochet-fringed coral dress, with a super sexy coral monokini with fringe as the show’s grand finale piece.
To complete the Miami-inspired look, Luli Fama partnered with René Furterer for the second consecutive year. To turn up the heat on the runway, celebrity hairstylist Adrien Flammier, Senior Hair Stylist of Atelier Emmanuel in San Francisco, led the exclusive René Furterer hair team backstage. Together they worked their magic to bring Luli’s vision to the catwalk. "Luli wants a look that's sophisticated with loose couture curls, but not too much so as to keep the hair natural,” said Adrien of the show’s hair. Luli added, “We wanted the look to be refined and sophisticated. Since the suits are so sexy we wanted to give the girls a more couture look.”
Get the Look
1. "Since most of the girls who arrived backstage came with limp hair — a result of the high humidity of Miami — I began by liberally spraying sections of hair with VOLUMEA volumizing conditioning spray - no rinse. Taking hair from underneath at the bottom layers and working my way to the crown, I saturated hair with product, then massaged it into hair with my hands prior to brushing it through.
2. "I removed the nozzle from my blowdryer, before rough-drying hair, using my hands instead of a brush to keep the natural texture of the hair. For models with fragile, chemically-treated and frizzy hair, instead of VOLUMEA I used AFTER SUN LEAVE-IN MOISTURIZING SPRAY on hair to close the cuticle and hydrate hair. LISSEA thermal protecting smoothing spray was then sprayed to protect hair from heat damage from the next steps. LISSEA thermal protecting smoothing spray also helps to repel the effects of humidity.
3. "After hair was rough-dried, I made a vertical part from the top of the ear to the crown to separate sides and front of hair from the back. Then I clipped hair in the back to the side to focus on styling hair on the sides.
4. "Next, using either the tail of a rattail comb or my fingers, I made one-inch sections in diagonal lines and wrapped them around a medium-barrel curling iron, holding for just a few seconds before releasing the clamp toward the middle part I created. I then slipped the barrel out and let the curl drop. We don’t take sections that are too skinny as we want to create loose curls and we don’t want to make them too tight.
5. "I worked my way to the crown on either side of part, and then applied the same method of curling for the hair in the back, wrapping the hair vertically around the curling iron in both directions so the resulting curls aren’t too uniform.
6. "Once all hair was curled, I gathered hair in back and tied it up in a large hair net, sort of like a snood. This is to keep the curls from drooping and falling out due to the humidity, while the models get their makeup done. At times, I would remove the net, to brush hair smooth at crown, directing it away from the face before wrapping hair in the net once more.
7. "Once hair was removed from the net, a few models needed a little touching up with the curling iron to revive definition of curl and give it more support.
8. "Last, I loosened up hair with a large paddle brush and my hands and gave hair a final misting of VEGETAL FINISHING SPRAY and GLOSSING SPRAY on each side of the middle part. While some models had island flower garland crowns, a fedora or floppy hats, all models walked the runway with glossy, gorgeous hair with loose, luxurious couture waves!
[Images: John M. Craig for René Furterer]
