Casablanca Spring 2022

Casblanca is a brand built around tennis. The brand describes their aesthetic as ‘a fusion between lux and leisurewear…a modern reimagining of the timeless apres-sport aesthetic’ but their Spring 2022 Ready-To-Wear collection doesn’t feel particularly sporty. Their French-Moroccan founder Charaf Tajer was clearly influenced by the Memphis movement which came out of Milan in the 1980s, but he also claims that Karl Lagerfield was an important source of inspiration.

“The exercise that Lagerfeld did with Chanel is definitely quite surrealistic, when you think about it,” Tajer says in Vogue. “He took one of the oldest houses of fashion and turned it into one of the most Pop and still relevant brands in the world. He had this panache that we want to put in Casablanca as well — this sort of freedom to not take itself seriously.”

As a result the collection feels like a dreamy re-imagining of a time which isn’t quite the 1960s or the 1970s. Chunky plastic jewellery and short skirts are found alongside flowy silk shirts and even silkier cravats — there’s even glimpses of the 1980s power suit thrown into the mix.

While there’s not much, the colour palette is perhaps the part of the collection which screams ‘tennis’ the loudest. Pops of white cool down the bright, Memphis style, stopping it from becoming overwhelming. Thick white stripes are often thrown into the mix, and burgundy tracksuits are edged with flashes of white to prevent them from becoming too night-time.

That, after all, is Casablanca’s vision — to offer ‘pieces for wearing when the day’s exertions are done, but the night has not yet begun’ and it’s a liminal space which they tread well. Crochet is used in a way outside of its beachy connotations, and styling the majority of the collection with trainers prevents it from becoming too uncomfortable. The collection feels wearable, but exciting enough to make a statement; a perfect mixture of ‘ath’ and ‘leisure’.