Ruohan SS24 and interview with Ruohan Nie

In the second installment of Ruohan Nie's three collection series, "Line" is a wonderful study of conveying that lines can run forever. Designers strive to design timeless collections that can be versatile through seasons and time, few are successful at it. Ruohan Nie is successful with this season after season through her study in design and textiles. This entire collection has been thoughtfully processed in a 360° way, everything ties in within the collection as well as to the previous collection and to the upcoming one. Thankfully Ruohan was able to speak with me about her thought process behind this collection and I'll tell you what, I can't wait to see the conclusion of this series next season.

Could you tell me a little bit about when you started the brand? 

I started the brand in 2021 back in New York. I graduated from Parsons in 2020 and I was working a little bit at The Row and afterwards I worked at La Garçonne, it's a multi-brand store in Tribeca and then I started my own brand in 2021. September was my first collection. 

I was at your show last season and the aesthetics are just so beautiful. What do you value the most about the design process? 

I think because we are a super young brand right now, I'm still at the stage of building my design structure. For me the design is getting more rational so that I can have output every day. It's really important for me. So within this collection, this is the 2nd phase of the entire 3 phase series, I'm building up my design structure. That's what I think is most important for me right now… to have not only aesthetics but a structure to translate my design, my vision, and then to fully tell who I am. 

Who's your Ruohan person? 

I think definitely sophisticated is the word to describe her. But I don't think we should have age boundaries or we should have like what her job is, what her salary is. Maybe she loves reading, or she loves movies, or she's a musician or she's a mother or she's just an average woman. I think everyone could be a Ruohan girl because I feel our spectrum in the brand is quite broad. It is inclusive of a wide range of people and they can all find themselves within the world of Ruohan.

What did you have in mind when you designed this collection? 

This collection, as I mentioned, is the 2nd phase of the entire series. Last collection, AW23 is the collection around “form” and this [SS24] collection is about “line” and then the next collection is about “points”. I really want to portray the longevity of this brand. We [designers] say we want to design a timeless wardrobe. I designed a series comprised of 3 collections, 3 iterations of a concept and that’s important for me. I was thinking to be more rational, in this collection. I separated this question of “line” into six chapters, six steps. “Line” is the first time I tried to use this kind of mathematical thinking in my design technique.

I do see this kind of textile architecture that is from last season to this season. So where do you see the collection going next season, since you mentioned the 3rd installment.

I think maybe everything should be more minimal. But actually this season at the very beginning, I was thinking I think I'm gonna minimize it. For instance, I didn't want to have a lot of color, maybe just white, black and shades of gray to interpret “lines”. I was thinking, maybe just get colors from a brush stroke to do this collection, but I was into this book called, “The Literature of Line” within the research of this collection and they separate lines as rational lines and emotional lines. And then I was like, why do I really need to frame myself from macro to micro as a linear strategy, why not just proceed to portray whatever stage I am at. So where I am at right now actually incorporates a little bit of color.

This season the color palette is taken from the river next to our office in Shanghai. Every day I try to take a picture and grab the color palette. The waves in the water are living lines. You can also see a little shine from the sun cycle and a bit of silver. There is even some dusty blue in the collection.