Ukrainian designer Svitlana Bevza can hardly believe that the war in her home country is still raging on in the third year since the Russian invasion.
“I don’t understand where the end is,” she said, chatting during a presentation of her spring 2025 Bevza collection at the Ukrainian Institute of America.
The designer is back and forth from London, where her kids are now in school, to Kiev, where her husband and business remain. And while she admits some probably expect to see aggressive or militaristic fashion from her — bullet necklaces, for example — Bevza’s mission is to reflect the beauty and resilience of her homeland through fashion. “I don’t think you should romanticize war,” she said.
This season she was inspired by a phrase from the Ukrainian national anthem: “Our enemies will die, as the dew does in the sunshine.” That translated into delicate crystal droplet embellishments on several looks, including on a cloud-like ivory organza cape cut from two squares to throw over an evening dress or cigarette pants, and the stretchy strapless bodice of an elegant black jumpsuit.
She carried over her tulip skirts and bodysuits, which have been brisk sellers with her younger customers, as well as the apron dress nodding to her culture, done this season in doe white with braiding detail.
The designer also expanded her use of spikelets, a symbol of Ukraine’s fertile land that she first used on necklaces, and transformed the shapes into hardware on bags, and now belts, tie-bars and showpieces, like the bustier covered in them. She debuted a new bag shape called Crushed Grain, a take on her original flat crescent Grain silhouette that can be crushed into a fortune-cookie-like pouch that fastens with a magnet.
Minor fashion week annoyances are put in stark perspective when listening to Bevza talk about keeping her label going when the lights are out because of Russia’s attacks on the Ukrainian electrical system. And even at New York Fashion Week, the designer can’t forget about the responsibility she has for her team: “I miss them all…they are brave.”