NEW YORK, May 10, 2010 / — Split page books, sometimes referred to as flipbooks, were designed to allow the reader to mix and match different combinations of the book’s contents, giving them the ability to create a variety of personalized combinations and storylines.

This collection sees Schwab split his story into three, and in doing so gives us what seems like an endless sequence of possible identities: unrelated and sometimes contradicting references are methodically mixed, matched and mismatched in one garment.

The look is then completed with another contradiction: industrial style sunglasses – a collaboration with Berlin-based eyewear brand MYKITA, whose circular frames are cut complete from thin sheets of stainless steel, before being folded into shape. Two models, HAMILTON & JANE were created for summer.

HAMILTON was inspired by the glasses, as well as the allure, of the actress Linda Hamilton; who plays Sarah Connor, in the movie Terminator. These are glasses created for a strong woman. A horizontal bar on the top of the frame joins the two small lens circles, and a vertical line again joins the top bar with the nose bridge. HAMILTON is industrial looking but still sleek, rather cold and geometric in its shape, and harks back to glasses spotted on club kids of the 90’s.

JANE is a softer round model, which reminds us of sunglasses worn by John Lennon or Yoko Ono. Here the lens diameter is bigger, making this shape seem friendlier than the HAMILTON model.

Both models, especially when combined with the clothing of the collection picture modern English eccentricity, mixing such different looks like a Victorian silhouette with a 90’s club kid look.

The color palette contrasts light and dark colors: candy colors – mauve and powder – on the one hand transport a very feminine and playful feel, whilst dark colors fir green, ultramarine and black give off a hard edged look.

Both models feature colored tone on tone lenses matching the lacquer color of the frame, with a slight mirror effect, which makes the wearer seem rather cold and robot-like.

Schwab mixes textures, colors, prints and silhouettes, combining different eras to restore a poetic element that has been missing from fashion for some time, creating a look that is personal beyond the dictated trends of the past, and thus a style that goes beyond the future of fashion, as we presently perceive it.