Masai-Deco for Spring - Summer 2011

Mixing black Africa with the rustle of the Belle Époque. Tiny, brightly coloured Masai beads mixed with pearls. Cascading chokers, bracelets, earrings with bunches of coloured tassels. The radiant vitality of tribal Africa and classicism.

Rada has created an exquisite metissage. Pearls are the pivot on which imaginative diversions rotate: stones, embroidery and strass bundle together on a framework of fabric. Afro decoration is the diamond point of a collection which sweeps through the twentieth-century: from the long necklaces of the flappers to the iconography of the fifties.

Rada combines Art Nouveau and post-war hedonism, bringing together geographical borders with the language of jewels.

"Narrative" necklaces speak about those who wear them.

Swathes of grosgrain with a regimental pattern escort long strings of Charleston-style pearls. Fabric collars carry pearly rivers, broken up by glittery strass.

Colours change from sage-mud-white, to shades of emerald, teal and turquoise.
Strong and summery, gold and straw yellow couples are modulated amongst fabrics and stones.

The exuberance of the 1950s pin up girl gleefully explodes: in the macro domes of sparkling earrings, the polychrome fabrics, the bracelets set with macro strass.

Intentionally excessive jewel case pendants: deification is in the orange, pink, yellow triptych,just as Bettie Page would have wanted. Small, circular loops of sharp-cut butter and dusty pink coloured organza, which make a sea of embroidery, pearls and strass converge to create spectacularly long chokers.

Racks of strass meander over sandals, creating brilliant creepers on jewels of t-shirts. Row of beads create tube shapes on cheerful bags: from shoppers with afro tassels to shoulder bags with ornamental piping.

Showy ostentation becomes a refined game, Rada style.