Unfiltered Variety. Valentino Pre-Fall 2023

May 9, 2023 | Design & Culture by Ed

Scrolling through the images Valentino provided for pre-fall 2023, the impression was that of a wildly over-saturated wardrobe where luxe was given a twist of cool, in keeping with Pierpaolo Piccioli’s current direction. “The idea of a wardrobe as a vocabulary of various and diverse semantic layers has always fascinated me. Every one of us is a collector, creating a vision through selection and personal taste”, the designer summed it up. The collection has it all. At some points, even too much. Valentino’s PPPink returns, just like the monogram logo. The V-neck sweater tucked in a brocade full-circle skirt look felt sciura in a Prada way; a sweatshirt worn over an evening dress gave Jenna Lyons; some of the more bare-it-all looks made me surprisingly think of Alessandro Dell’Acqua’s early 2000s style. The nonchalant, unfiltered variety of separates is styled in the “counterintuitive way” Piccioli embraces – but this method tends to worryingly look like a collection of inspirations, rather than an actual Valentino look. However when you consider the pieces separately, they do have a polished ease about them, with no conceptual detours. Broad-shouldered masculine pantsuits introduced the monochrome palette that punctuated the evening offer. Dense pops of bright green and Valentino red added vitality to sleek long dresses with side bow-knotted cut-outs, as well as to fluid jumpsuits with wide palazzo pants. Glamorous, they exuded the charisma of haute dolce vita ingrained in the house’s codes. Quiet luxury? Never heard of her.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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The Essentials. Balenciaga Pre-Fall 2023

May 5, 2023 | Design & Culture by Ed

Balenciaga‘s pre-fall 2023 look-book – made up of dressing room selfies – is a cleverly staged invitation for the customers to come back to the brand’s shops. And a reminder, much like Demna’s winter runway show in Paris, that the Balenciaga creative director remains one of the key architects of the look of contemporary fashion. The emphasis on exaggerated suiting, the embrace of couture-ish shapes, and the return of rave jeans – all of that is covered, just in time as the new season clothes start hitting the shops. Double-breasted black blazers were alternately puffed up with a layer of padding, or cropped at the hips, with the hems tucked under in almost makeshift fashion. A third was worn like a wrap, its buttons askew. Demna cut similar styles in glen plaids and checks. More so than the runways, Balenciaga’s pre-season collections are devoted to daily wear. And so there were oversize parkas, peacoats and trenches with more of those folded under hems, fluid velvet sweatsuit separates in surprising pastels, and denim in both raver proportions and a newer skinny cut lopped off at the knees. Standing in for the dramatic evening dresses in the March show were a couple of full-length looks in a quotidian key, one dress in a body-conscious knit and a shrunken logo hoodie and matching ankle-length skirt in what looked like stretch velvet. The accessories game is strong too: Le Cagole comes in sportier shapes, and Pantashoes are revisited in Margiela-esque fishnet overlays.

A Line of Beauty. Chanel SS’1999 Couture

April 28, 2023April 28, 2023 | Design & Culture by Ed

On Monday, May 1st, the 2023 Met Gala will take place. This year’s Costume Institute exhibition, “A Line of Beauty,” will celebrate the oeuvre and life of Karl Lagerfeld. The exhibition will see Andrew Bolton and Wendy Yu, curators in charge, examine the work of Karl Lagerfeld (1933–2019). Throughout his lifetime, Lagerfeld worked at prominent fashion houses such as Balmain, Chloé, Fendi, Chanel, in addition to founding his namesake brand. More than 150 pieces will be on display in the exhibition, many of which will be accompanied by Lagerfeld’s sketches. In the last couple of days, I looked back at my all-time favorite Chanel collections, designed by the one & only Karl. Here is the last one, a special one: it has a very special place in my heart. Hope some of these magnificent vintage looks will end up on the red carpet on the first Monday in May…

Lightness is the quality that made Karl Lagerfeld’s late 1990s and early 2000s haute couture collections sing. He gave the concept a literal spin for spring-summer 1999 by abolishing black from this collection entirely. There was a quietness to this line-up that the neutral and pastel palette contributed to. Floating tulle and organza captured the collection’s dreamy mood in a truly delightful way. Maisons de couture have workrooms dedicated to flou (draping) and tailoring. Lagerfeld didn’t ignore the latter, but there wasn’t an ounce of stiffness in the soft, almost sporty, haberdashery he sent out that season. Bold accessories offered a contrast to the suppleness of the collection. Small, sculpted gold bags and earrings that were abstract falls of silver hoops inserted a sort of tech-y vibe into the goings-on and seemed to signal that as the fin de siècle loomed, Lagerfeld was looking forward, not back. The relative scarcity of Cocoisms meant there was more room for a bit of playfulness, like the triple scoop of sherbet-colored taffeta looks that appeared near the end of the show, worn by Devon Aoki (raspberry), Colette Pechekhonova (blueberry), and Esther Cañadas (lemon). They proved so utterly irresistible that Uma Thurman wore Cañadas’s dress to the Oscars that year.

Cosmopolitan Elegance. Chanel Pre-Fall 2017

April 25, 2023January 6, 2024 | Design & Culture by Ed

On Monday, May 1st, the 2023 Met Gala will take place. This year’s Costume Institute exhibition, “A Line of Beauty,” will celebrate the oeuvre and life of Karl Lagerfeld. The exhibition will see Andrew Bolton and Wendy Yu, curators in charge, examine the work of Karl Lagerfeld (1933–2019). Throughout his lifetime, Lagerfeld worked at prominent fashion houses such as Balmain, Chloé, Fendi, Chanel, in addition to founding his namesake brand. More than 150 pieces will be on display in the exhibition, many of which will be accompanied by Lagerfeld’s sketches. In the following days, I will look back at my all-time favorite Chanel collections, designed by the one & only Karl. Hope some of these magnificent looks will end up on the red carpet on the first Monday in May…

“The Ritz is very gilded,” said Karl Lagerfeld, gesturing toward the decor of the newly refurbished Paris hotel as he held court on a plush velvet couch in the lobby. “Look, white with gold!” Sparkle, sequins, gold metallics, even gold-dipped feathers naturally became a festive-looking thread in the Chanel Métiers d’Art 2017 collection. Coco Chanel famously lived at the Ritz from 1937 throughout World War II, and died here in 1971. The house of Chanel is steps away from the hotel’s back door, on the Rue Cambon. Lagerfeld’s angle, though, wasn’t the life of Chanel herself, but, he emphasized, “cosmopolitan elegance and people from all over the world who’ve come to the Ritz. There were hundreds of dinners in the ’20s and ’30s, where women wore incredible things. But you cannot tell from the collection what decade it is, and I think that is modern, no?” The brilliantly chic show, which was served up in three sittings at lunch, tea, and dinnertime, sent a mixed bunch of lanky models, “daughters-of,” and Pharrell Williams winding their way around tables in the hotel lobby and a specially built “Jardin d’Hiver.” It made sense as a ready-made scene without any need for flown-in props. The Ritz is exactly where the international high-rolling couture customers billet themselves while shopping in Paris. Hair up in net veils decorated with roses, the girls pranced at a clip in midi skirts and Lurex pedal pushers, bubble-shaped capes, and square-shouldered jackets. There were skinny knit silvery dresses, a gorgeous white lace poet-sleeved blouse with a black leather cape and pants, a navy sheared mink tailored coat piped in gold leather, and tiered skirts flouncing out from narrow dropped-waist bodices. It was less a look than a cocktail menu of individual styles, really. But as Lagerfeld put it, that is the measure of the distance between Coco Chanel’s time and ours. “In those days, even to the ’60s, there were one or two designers who dictated what everyone wore. That is not the case today, when there are thousands of images of fashion available, so anyone can choose to wear what suits her.” Just as long as they belong to the Chanel glitterati, in this case.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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All-Out Femininity. Chanel SS’2004 Couture

April 24, 2023April 25, 2023 | Design & Culture by Ed

On Monday, May 1st, the 2023 Met Gala will take place. This year’s Costume Institute exhibition, “A Line of Beauty,” will celebrate the oeuvre and life of Karl Lagerfeld. The exhibition will see Andrew Bolton and Wendy Yu, curators in charge, examine the work of Karl Lagerfeld (1933–2019). Throughout his lifetime, Lagerfeld worked at prominent fashion houses such as Balmain, Chloé, Fendi, Chanel, in addition to founding his namesake brand. More than 150 pieces will be on display in the exhibition, many of which will be accompanied by Lagerfeld’s sketches. In the following days, I will look back at my all-time favorite Chanel collections, designed by the one & only Karl. Hope some of these magnificent looks will end up on the red carpet on the first Monday in May…

“Paradox. A mix of severity and frivolity,” said Karl Lagerfeld, explaining his high concept for Chanel’s spring-summer 2004 haute couture. “That’s what modern sexiness is: ambiguity.” Think an impeccable plain jacket contradicted by a frothy-and-flounce skirt, or a cloudy tulle shrug grounded by a plumb line-straight column of black crêpe. Or perhaps a dress cut as sportily as a tank at the top that becomes a trail of extravagant frills by the time it reaches the floor. The last, worn by Liya Kebede and glinting with silver sequins, is an eternal natural for the red carpet. And the feather cape worn by the show’s bride – Alek Wek – was another Hollywood-perfect moment. There was a new sense of restraint in this collection. By rebalancing delicacy with discipline, Lagerfeld put just as much emphasis on defining the Chanel jacket as on all-out femininity. Those jackets – narrow, linear, and undecorated – hit at the top of the hip without a hint of cinch or cling, the better to contrast with a tulle puff of a skirt below. He also flipped the intellectual equation by working upper-body volume in billowing poet blouses paired with something straight and to the knee. Of course, making an elegant withdrawal from overt display is all relative when it comes to the haute couture. Intertwined with Lagerfeld’s play of opposites was the subtle planting of 3 million euros’ worth of spectacular Chanel fine jewelry.