Daks by Giles Deacon

MILAN, February 20, 2008
By Nicole Phelps
Now in his third season at Daks, Giles Deacon has begun to tame his tendency to create the one-off showpiece (or a show full of them) and instead put together a more cohesive, complete collection. He started things off with leather outerwear, moving from a soft-shouldered olive trench to a brown cocoon coat with a gathered neck—both as smart as they were sensible. More sportif were a quilted jacket in safety orange and a black hooded stadium coat. The show's strongest toppers were trapeze-shaped and came in a substantial purple or iridescent gray tweed; he used the same fabric for a pencil skirt and a blouson jacket. Other skirtsuits—cropped and fitted jackets worn with the season's new calf-grazing, narrow skirt—came with neat little scarves tied at the neck, a reminder of this British label's proper past.

Where Deacon faltered was with the evening pieces. Maybe he'd used up all his good ideas in London, or at Fay, the American brand owned by the Tod's Group, for which he debuted a 25-piece capsule collection earlier this week? In any case, the Daks dresses—a lineup of loose, waistless silk numbers in gray or bright pink embellished at the bodice with matching paillettes—felt slack compared to his polished tailoring.