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If Roman god of the sea, Neptune, was a girl with a penchant for geometric digital prints evocative of anemones and electric eels, what would she wear? Most would think this an (extremely) odd question, but it’s not one that surfaces without a catalytic image to buoy it up; nor is it one without an answer, that answer being emergent Milanese fashion house Tothem’s latest Spring/Summer offering: the Mermaid collection.


Permutations of a quasi-mythical narrative (“about the sea’s unseen secrets as well as the metamorphosis of mermaids into women”) and an aesthetic inspired by all things aquatic slice through the collection, revealing a core founded on functionality,  as well as fantasy: luxe leggings, bathing bodysuits and comfortable cotton tees all feature, forming a base – or a seabed, if you will – onto which gauzy nylon raincoats and swishy, silken skirts that accentuate, as well as obscure, seem to sprout as if whipped up in a maelstrom of material-based sea foam.



Since launching in the summer of 2012, Tothem have – over the course of their four precedent collections – adhered to their central design aim (“to transfer photographic compositions of the author through modern digital printing techniques on textiles”)rather strictly. And it’s not only commendable – the creation of and the keeping to an ethos – but it works, very well indeed: an iridescent colour palette, spiked with a clutch of divergent textures and prints; so simple, yet so much to explore and immerse oneself in.



At its most esoteric and abstract, Tothem’s Mermaid Collection melds with the mystery and artistry of totems – providing the wearer with the means to “put in discussion the various entities that can be invoked through the observation of… photographic games as the research result of their own being”; and at its most elemental, Tothem’s Mermaid Collection provides the wearer – whether they be a mythical sea sylph or a plain, old homo sapien – with clothes that allow them to dive into the fantastical, whilst keeping both feet firmly on the ground.
Tara Okeke

For more information, check out the Tothem website.