If it’s one thing that can bring an entire city to it’s knees, it’s NYC humidity. If you’ve experienced this tropical cloud pass, you know what I’m talking about. We arrived at the Highline Hotel yesterday in the midst of this heat and found it’s green courtyards to be a gentle reprieve from the dense exhaust of city air. We were here for Harare’s SS15 collection, set in the 19th century halls of this former Theological Seminary. It began to rain and the courtyard emptied and guests  were ushered upstairs to the second floor.  We entered a domed hall with stained glass, golden chandeliers and verdant flora. It was the perfect set up. It was exactly like stepping into a Rousseau painting. The collection is a nod to the nomadic Berber people of Northern Africa. The designer wanted to express the intimate relationship between the wandering nomad and the landscape. The desert, as they say, is their sky and they can feel its changes. The clothes were imaginative in pattern, as always, and the draping dramatic and fluid, both haphazard and deliberate. There is a kind of wild refinement about this designer that is very pleasing. A beautiful deep v cut caftan appeared in tones of rose and nude with gold spangling trailing in the back. Intricate hand embroidery in magenta, mustard, lime and burgundy created a story for these people through the eyes and imagination of the designer. She was drawing a story with her collection, giving homage to the ancient wanderer but collecting the spirit here, in this majestic hall. — Jeanie Kwak