KATIE ROWLAND’S TALE OF LILITH
The queen of accessorising, Iris Apfel said “If you have one good little black dress and lots of accessories, you can change the look of the dress and have umpteen outfits”. Â In this time of ecconomic recession, where civil servants are vanishing into thin air, the price of petrol has risen so high that you would think they lace it with gold, and the talk of a shopping spree in Harvey Nicols with the girls is a distant memory due to financial restrain, Iris Apfen’s quote has been the source of my recession survival.
My new addiction is no longer the statement dress but rather the statement jewellery. During the chaos of the London Fashion Week (And the not so glamourous running around the sweaty tube stations, from Somerset House to the Freemason Hall in Convent Gardens) I came across the jewellery designer Katie Rowland displaying her collection. Â Like a little magpie spotting something shiny across the room, I was drawn in.
Painting by John Collier
The collection is poised elegance with a seductive edge. Alluring warm red and yellow golds dominate the collection, reflecting themes of worship through seduction and sin. Rowland was inspired by biblical references to Lilith, who was Adam’s first wife in the Garden of Eden. Demonised as a fallen woman, God threw her out of Paradise for refusing to be subservient to her husband and bearing his children. Lilith, following the course of true love, instead partnered with Archangel Samael, infuriating God further.
As a goddess of the night, her beauty gave her the ability to lure men into sacrificial unions. Triangles, symbolic of the holy trinity, are shaped into rings, earrings and pendants, connected by delicate chains.
The S/S 2011 collection mirrors Lilith’s treacherous nature and resemblance to vampires. Pieces edged with stone appear fang like and give the collection a dangerous yet sensual feel. Rowland gracefully embraces the deity’s sexual nature with smooth polished forms that stimulate the senses with elegance.
