Stamp of Style: Designer Katrantzou’s New Mary Mare Collection

With a traditional photoshoot impossible, Katrantzou’s team put together an illustrated campaign with the new looks of Mary Mare on vintage stamps


Among the many industries severely impacted by the Covid-19 lockdown, is that of fashion. Photoshoots for new collections are out of the question for the time being, making it difficult for designers to promote their new creations.

Luckily, London-based Greek designer Mary Katrantzou and her team have found a way around this unprecedented situation: For the launch of the brand’s latest collection titled Mary Mare, the team designed a campaign made exclusively with illustrations. These illustrations comprise 12 vintage post stamps, which constitute the core of the collection and are featured on the majority of its pieces.

The stamps have been modified for the purposes of the campaign: drawings of women wearing some of the collection’s pieces have been wittily embedded within the stamp frames.

The colorful stamps depict these elegant women against backdrop of classic illustrations of 12 attractive holiday destinations including Cannes, Venice, Biarritz, and Greece.

This is not the first time the brand has been informed by the world of stamps; in fact it has been using philately, as well as conchology (the study of sea shells), as sources of inspiration for the past ten years. The latest resort wear capsule collection seeks to celebrate this milestone, constituting an ode to its trademark style.

Signature shirt and trouser shapes have been re-invented in new and lighter fabrics, while prints of postage stamps and sea shells have been printed on dresses, shirts, pants, swimsuits and accessories made of fabrics such as cotton poplin, linen, silk twill and lycra. 

In a wider sense, Mary Mare is a marriage between revised key pieces and new elements such as swimwear, hats and bags, aiming to offer customers a plethora of new ways to embrace color and print in travel-ready looks, and whet their appetite for future holidays when the crisis comes to an end.

And indeed, the 12 looks have truly awakened our longing for holidays in the sunniest places. 

Mary Mare, Mary Katrantzou’s first ‘all-year-around’ collection is now live on the brand’s website. 3 of the 12 stamps will be released daily on instagram with a #WishWeWereThere theme starting May 7.



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