Photos by Olesya Parfenyuk
Designer Alexandra Oliveira invites us into a world of twisting chrochets, motley shags and shimmering fringe. The creative mind behind the label pé de chumbo, Alexandra develops her looks from raw textiles to finished garment, creating unique fabrics using her own signature techniques, with 90 percent being completely handmade.
Alexandra founded the brand in 1995 from Guimarães, near Porto, Portugal, where she was born and raised and continues to dream up new ideas for pé de chumbo today. In between, she studied fashion design at Citex Porto and has since participated in several international and Portuguese fashion and textile art exhibitions.
For the pé de chumbo AW 23 collection, presented at Portugal Fashion, dark petrol, lilac and midnight blue took the runway in long, sleek lines and caped silhouettes, interspersed with matte oranges, greens and blues that mimicked the territorial patchwork of a map. The vast universe of wool came in a variety of weaves and textures, sometimes slinky and smooth, sometimes stiff and coarse, or even resembling a wool “fur” or a fisherman’s net. Metallic silver and golden looks mixed with polished pieces in off-white and black closed the show, in styles hearkening back to the roaring ’20s. Our favourite piece? Definitely the long fringed coat in eggshell white!
Edited by Michaela Doyle
To boot…
View Pé de Chumbo’s past collections at Portugal Fashion.
Pé de Chumbo
@pedechumbo_oficial | www.pedechumbo.pt
