Make A Scene. Thom Browne SS23

October 7, 2022October 6, 2022 | Design & Culture by Ed

Thom Browne, as usual, delivered something more than a fashion show. His spring-summer 2023 presentation was a sort of dreamy and very dramatic performance. In his own words, it was “an American prom mixed with Cinderella mixed with the Paris Opera.” Gwendoline Christie provided a scene to remember. She emerged in a full-length, single-breasted, white-piped, braided blazer and some marvelous golden sandals with little effigies of Browne’s dachshund, Hector, at the front of each foot. After a slow mosey around the golden halls, she returned and began spritzing herself with cologne and brushing her locks. And then she told the guests what was to come: “Thom loves his little stories – and this is going to be a very long story.” And the story went a little bit like this: four rouge-lipped hot boys came and removed Christie’s dressing table, wearing quintessential Browne gray tailoring and kilts: salarymen at a Scottish reel. Then came 20 opera coats – the first in a tricolored arrangement – with collegiate numbers on each back. The came five frock coats and three swing skirts with petticoats, plus one white witch extra. And then all 20 coat wearers returned with their unders revealed: all polka-dot tailoring and pastels and peekaboo underwear. The best section ran 52 to 56, when the punks invaded the assembly. Vivienne Westwood was an unavoidable comparison, but in a Thom-Browne-kind-of-way.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Exploring Tensions. GmbH SS23

October 6, 2022 | Design & Culture by Ed

Though launched as a menswear label six years ago, GmbH is actually more like an ecosystem. Fashion is the baseline, of course, but its network spans artists, musicians, DJs, writers, muses, and friends of every stripe who resonate with its message of “decolonizing” attitudes. The spring-summer 2023 collection, called „Ghazal”, after the ancient form of Arabic poetry, officially marked the first time the designers focused on fleshing out a woman’s wardrobe, but it played more like an exercise in continuity. Exploring the tensions between religion, morality, freedom, and sex offered ample fodder – and given that Benjamin Huseby and Serhat Isik are simultaneously easing into their new role at Trussardi in Milan, they managed to pull the whole thing off with flair. “Blurry boundaries were always kind of interesting to us,” Isik offered backstage about a collection billed as “beach to ballroom, and maybe club, opera, and ashram.”. Spirituality – specifically protection and healing – was a leitmotif. Evil eyes cropped up as buttons, and prints developed with Java-based Indonesian artist Muhammad “Rofi” Fatchurofi were inspired by the transformative properties of water. On the runway there were continent-hopping, gender-fluid ideas about tailoring: a draped skirt with a matching shirt conveyed glamour with the ease of pajamas, while a similar one slipped under a crisply constructed leather jacket fused a European construct with the lungi worn by men across Asia. Another, worn alone, was accessorized with a shell necklace by the Berlin-based designer Nhat-Vu Dang, who lent several striking pieces to the show. GmbH also revisited last season’s talisman prints in Arabic calligraphy by the Berlin-based Syrian artist Abdelrazak Shaballot, transposing the affirmations “safe from harm,” “wisdom,” and “knowledge” onto lasered denim or slip dresses in blue and white. Not so long ago, shorts in denim or vinyl worn with or without a two-pocket apron belt – or perhaps a fur stole – would have skewed more club than night at the opera. Which was the designers’ point: nowadays, anything goes.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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And Time Goes By… Givenchy SS23

October 6, 2022 | Design & Culture by Ed

After exiting Burberry, Riccardo Tisci should return to Givenchy. It would be a perfect homecoming, because it seems only he could understand how to direct the brand in contemporary times. Seasons come and go, and Matthew Williams still has no clue what’s Givenchy’s identity, and what’s worse, what’s his role in writing the house’s history. It’s really difficult to find the spirit of Givenchy, properly revisited, and any signs of Williams’ input in the spring-summer 2023 collection. Even Carine Roitfeld’s styling didn’t help (quite ironic – she was a key person for the brand during Tisci’s reign). The line-up was a mash-up of familiar things. We’ve got some random-looking Chanel tweeds. There’s early Demna for Balenciaga vibe. There’s Hedi Slimane’s Celine, over and over again. Hoodies worn under blazers, styled with cargo shorts, seem to be the biggest takeaway from the entire line-up, but we’ve seen that styling trick many, many times on other runways. The eveningwear had no novelty in it, as it referenced Hubert De Givenchy’s archives in form of boring „re-editions”. And it felt completely out of place after a line-up filled with denim and combats. The inconsistency of the collection was the most striking thing about it. Also, what’s the point of having an outdoor presentation in October, especially in drizzling Paris? The pouring rain made the whole event feel even more depressing and frustrating. Williams’ contract at Givenchy is coming to an end, and I doubt it will be prolonged. The brand should really consider the choice of next creative director, because with the flow of time, the brand is becoming a wreck.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Back To Basics. Valentino SS23

October 6, 2022 | Design & Culture by Ed

Knowing Pierpaolo Piccioli‘s skills and abilities of making fashion that sparks deep emotions, the designer could do much better for spring-summer 2023 than covering his silhouettes in Valentino‘s “V” logos. At least, there’s no sight of last season’s PPPink, which from a good-looking idea turned to a curse of street style. But the opening look, a caped dress in the palest of beiges that was graphically emblazoned with the house’s logo, just didn’t feel good. The marque was over absolutely everything, including the gloved bodysuit worn under the dress. It was even painted across the model’s face. Not everything went through logomania in this line-up, but in general this was one of Piccioli’s most uninspired collections in a long while. Piccioli focused his look on mostly flowing, undulating dresses, short or long, some scissored away at the waist (inspired by the slashed canvases of artist Lucio Fontana) and soft suiting that was androgynous with or without the feathery trims, in myriad shades of ivory, beige and brown, his celebration of the beauty of every skin tone. During the course of the show, he started to introduce bright saturated colors as a contrast – electric blue, acid green, emerald green – which looked at their most dazzling when deployed for the dream-it-and-we-can-make-it technical marvel of his pleated sequin pieces, such as a shrug it on coat, or a sweeping floor-length backless evening dress. But in overall, the offering felt rather flat and repetitive, noting that there were over 90 looks.

Collage by Edward Kanarecki.
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Stand Together. Comme Des Garçons SS23

October 5, 2022 | Design & Culture by Ed

“A lamentation for the sorrow in the world today / And a feeling of wanting to stand together.” So disclosed the press notes for the return of Comme des Garçons to Paris. Rei Kawakubo is back. And trust Kawakubo to lean against the prevailing winds, then transport us further and in fewer looks because of it. Last season, as Russia launched its invasion of Ukraine, fashionland scrambled to be somber, doffing the cap. This season, as that invasion and many other frightening geopolitical scenarios rumble on, normal escapist service has been resumed. But this was anti-fashion. Kawakubo’s process is personal and private: The design and its agenda is her business. Here there were perhaps a few readable clues in a collection whose looks were abstractedly sculptural. The models were their podiums. Was look 4 a worn egg cup or a woman inverted? Was look 16 a flowery doughnut or an ironically framed metaphysical void? But you might say something else entirely about these worn impressions. The only thing we’d all agree upon is that this was not conventional clothing. The level of fabric research was intense and heightened; slickly sheeny lacquered lace and sugary-sweet, color-heaped floral jacquards. On some looks you could see the fossilized traces of “normal” pieces – a biker here, a gown there – but all were distended and distorted and blown up or reduced via twists and aggregations of imagination. Some of the models wore headpieces in folded card flowers or apparently hodgepodge steampunk-ish assemblages, half-helmet, half-crown. Created under a briefing by Gary Card and Valériane Venance, these looked to resemble virgin crants, the maiden’s garlands in which young, prematurely deceased women were buried in pre-Reformation England. They were chilling.