Clements Ribeiro, the partnership of Suzanne Clements and Inacio Ribeiro, is a label I remember from when I first started getting into fashion as I followed their career from their own label to their longtime stint at Cacharel and now they are back again and will be relaunching their label in Paris in February 2009.  It's again part of that Jessica Ogden, Peter Jensen, Eley Kishimoto group of designers that I was quite obsessed with when I SERIOUSLY first got into fashion.  Before Clements Ribeiro's big launch, they have decided to launch something quite niche and small to see us through AW08-9.

Suzanna and Inacio have used their collection of reconditioned vintage cashmere pieces and have teamed up with long time collaborator Karen Nicol whose embroiderey skills have also been employed by Chloe and Marc Jacobs in the past.  Nicol has then embellished the cashmere with a mix of vintage buttons, bakelite jewellery, vintage couture embroidery swatches, Victorian beads, plastic corsages, Art Deco buckles and other bits and bobs that Karen has amassed over the year.  It's sort of like taking two pasts and making something beautiful out of the remnants that have come from the careers of Clements Ribeiro and Karen Nicol, so there's something quite personal about it.  Seeing as there are only ever going to be 200 pieces that are all unique, if I saw them in a shop, I'd feel like I was looking at someone else's DIY project that they just happened to not mind sharing with the world (I say world....it is going to be selected stockists alas...).   

The knitwear reminds me of this wonderful shop called Stitch Up on Parkway in Camden Town that used to exist a few years ago that sold vintage embroidered cashmere pieces and where I bought my first piece of cashmere (previously all my cashmere were mum's hand-me-downs...), feeling altogether accomplished and grown up when I came out of the shop.