Alejandra Alonso Rojas, by way of her young son, has been paying particular attention to space, planets, and constellations. While she was designing this pre-fall 2023 collection, the first images from NASA’s James Webb Space Telescope were released. She was particulary taken with Webb’s breathtaking visual of the star-forming region known as the Carina Nebula. Its navy blue background with ochre, orange, and brownish hues in the foreground influenced Rojas’s color palette and textile treatments.
This season, Rojas decided to expand on her eveningwear offering, based on market demand. Her signature silky slips and crochet silhouettes feel familiar and lived-in, with a tactile quality. Take look 6, a slip with a diagonal crochet panel inset at the right-side waist. The panel resembles a doily, “kind of like the lace tableware in Spain I grew up with,” she said. Continuing that homey narrative, Rojas widened the scope of her hand-dyeing story from dip-dyes (still present in some of her evening wear) to ice-dyeing. “The kitchen was a mess after, but they look so cool, like the layered explosions of color you’d see in the Aurora Borealis,” she said, adding that this is something she’ll carry into fall. The cashmere sweater in look 11 is a preview of what’s to come.
Tactility is a Rojas strongsuit. She’s building a cashmere program, which feels timely considering how trendy the yarn has become—Gigi Hadid and Brad Pitt have both recently launched cashmere labels. More compelling, however, was the addition of a limited-run of Japanese denim in a dark navy shade. The roughness of the denim—used in a few details spread throughout the lineup, as well as for a pair of jeans and a striking puffer jacket—added a layer of interest to the sweetness of Rojas’s clothes. On the larger pieces embroidered with zodiac constellations in Swarovski crystals, there was a welcome tension between the toughness of their canvas and the naivete of her motifs. This is a space Rojas could explore further; when she experiments with imperfection her pieces acquire more nuance.
