HC – Casino. Chanel AW15

July 8, 2015 | Design & Culture by Ed

This season, Karl Lagerfeld took us to a casino in oder to show, that everybody there wear Chanel haute couture. Karl’s muse splash – Stella Tennant, Kristen Stewart, Lara Stone, Julianne Moore – gambled on the roulette tables while the models circled the spacious runway. But it seemed, that this what the models wore during the show was the least important. The whole event of a casino stole the spotlight and nobody really looked at the fashion part. Well, maybe because all those dresses, little (black) jackets and tweed skirts felt… boring? During the last few seasons, if talking of couture, Karl gives us the same idea behind the clothes. Classy, lady-like silhouettes without any fantasy. Just look back at the last few seasons. The scenarios of runways are always amazing and Instagram-worthy, but the dresses (and haute couture is mostly about beautiful dresses!) are being neglected.

HC – Peculiar. Giambattista Valli AW15

July 7, 2015 | Design & Culture by Ed

Before designing the collection, Giambattista Valli created an impossible conversation between two women. Talitha Pol and Peggy Guggenheim. “Genuine eccentricity, in the DNA,” he explained. Indeed, his clothes exploded with peculiarity, from the very first look, with a tutu of tulle on a crepe sheath over slim pants. Also, an impressive dose of floral embroidery was seen on maxi gowns and fancy mini dresses. The show-stopping piece? Pants in a silvery metallic raffia that were paired with a big ball of ostrich feathers. But what really made everybody feel stunned nearly to death? The enormous, voluminous orange ruffles which were applied on simple white dresses.

HC – Eartly Delights. Dior AW15

July 7, 2015July 7, 2015 | Design & Culture by Ed

Eartly Delights – this is how the creative director of Dior, Raf Simons, entitled his haute couture collection. Full of Flemish art references and historic symbols, it is looking far into the future. Here are the three major things worth to know about this truly remarkable collection.

The venue. Raf Simons described the stunning set for Dior’s couture show as part church, part garden, part nightclub in Ibiza. The pointillist-painted panels could have been stained-glass windows or flowers. The purple carpet worked perfectly well as a psychodelic, quite fantastical element. In fact, a hallucinatory vibe penetrated the entire presentation. But the biggest fascination was caused by the pastel shaded melons, which were scattered around the place. Hieronymus Bosch’s Garden of Earthly Delights clearly appeared in everybody’s mind.

The idea. An ethereal collection but with Simons twist? This collection is just that. “Dior is always a fairy tale, no matter what I’m doing,” Simons said with a laugh, but yesterday’s show had a special magic, which wasn’t moved so intensely by the designer since his arrival to the house. During his backstage moment, Raf also explained the meaning of the title – “Coming out of the austerity of the Second World War, Dior was inspired by something he wasn’t supposed to be inspired by,” he said. “Glamour, excess, too much.” Seventy years later, Raf Simons is coming to the same point: forbidden fruit tastes sweetest. Just like the power of imagination.

The textures. Raf Simons is not only obsessed with today and the past at his namesake brand, but also at Dior. That is why his AW15 couture collection was a fusion of old and new. This is strongly visible in his outerwear – Simons’ dose of his own Belgian heritage into Dior’s referred back to “the Flemish masters and the sculptural drape, the velvety weight that men like Vermeer were able to communicate in paint, their models serenely poised with arms folded” as Tim Blanks translates. A coat/cape hybrid was the result of neoprene, couture embroidery and a fur stole which is all about mixing old with new.

HC – Bertrand Guyon. Schiaparelli AW15

July 6, 2015 | Design & Culture by Ed

Who is Bertrand Guyon? Formerly of Givenchy and Christian Lacroix, Guyon’s most recent post was held at Valentino. And now he is the creative director behind Schiaparelli, succeeding Marco Zanini. As I wrote a year ago when Zanini had his second collection at this historic fashion house, Elsa Schiaparelli legacy and style is so strong and so intense, that it is nearly impossible to lead the brand in symbiosis with her signatures and the designer’s personal style. For his first show, Bertrand and Schiaparelli studio presented a rich in embroideries collection, full of luxury textiles and embellishments. “Midnight velvet dress”, “gold-embroidered brocade suit” – the titles of each look from the brand’s ambassador instagram, Farida Khelfa , sound major. But by looking at all that mind-blowing beauty and craft, I can’t see any Guyon’s identity. More of fur? Sleeker silhouettes? No one knows. However, I am excited what the next season will be like with this mysterious designer. Hopefully its going to be more clear.

Jean Paul Gaultier at Grand Palais

July 4, 2015 | Design & Culture by Ed

Nicknamed “the enfant terrible of fashion” by the press since his first shows in the 70’s, Jean Paul Gaultier is undoubtedly one of the most important and avant-garde fashion designers of recent decades. Made between 1971 and 2015, the examples of his bold creativity have for the most part never been on public display like now at Grand Palais in Paris. His couture and ready-to-wear which always seemed to be different, very early caught on concerns and challenges of a multicultural society, playfully imposing aesthetic codes. More than any other couturier, this exhibition expresses his humanity. The whole event is divided into few “periods” of his career in fashion. The Odyssey refers to what might be named the “founding myths” of Paul’s universe – mariner chic and his signature stripes, mermaids and long sea voyages. Then, Gaultier had his vision of punk, but in a cancan version. Fascinated by the Paris of Belle Epoque, Toulouse Lautrec, the Moulin Rouge and Brassai, the couturier used to mix frivolous and flirty silhouettes with rebellious fashion outings and contoversy-causing way of dressing. From the beginning, the enfant terrible was attracted to unconventional beauties. Muses. Madonna, Kylie Minouge, Beth Ditto, Rossy De Palma and many more women and men who were full of “spark” gave Jean Paul Gaultier inspiration. Even the clothes he designed for Luc Besson’s film, Fifth Element, were designed by him because he felt close to the directors strong vision and imagination. I

n his collections, Gaultier questioned the concepts of gender, nudity and eroticism. While basing his ideas on those, Jean started to use textiles that weren’t used in couture before – latex, leather, fish net, harness and other fabrics that are associated with the word sexy. He offered hypersexualised clothing (like corset dresses) and evoked a new type of romance and fetishism in the world of fashion. In the last section of the exhibition, you can see the Urban Jungle – a fierce dose of colour and references to various ethnic groups. bullfighter bolero jackets, the shtreimel and long coats made of rabbits, gilets from Mongolia, geisha kimonos, flamenco skirts and African masks as the new bride alternative. And all of that modified with his long-time signatures – corset silhouettes and intense emphasis on details. Seeing all of these stages of Gaultier’s career seemed like a dream-come-true. And having a chance to observe and have a look at all those clothes, scenarios and extravagance felt quite insane, but great.