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Infos von den Fashion Shows
- Gabriele Colangelo
Just when you’re ready to sound the death knell for prints, along comes Gabriele Colangelo’s first pre-fall collection. The Italian up-and-comer designed a gorgeous forest-scape suffused in either chartreuse or fire engine red that made a strong argument for another season of bold color and pattern. We’ll be surprised if one street-style star or another doesn’t snap up the sharply cut lapel-less coat in the collection’s final look for the upcoming fashion show circuit.
With statement-making prints like that, Colangelo was smart to keep silhouettes clean and simple. The minimal streak extended to a pair of faux fur coats that were as streamlined as they were shaggy. Those look like they could be a hit with the fashion crowd, too.
—Nicole Phelps
- Bottega Veneta
Not unlike his last runway collection, Tomas Maier’s pre-fall lineup had a smart, urban look. And not just because the graphic print on a stretch jersey sheath was inspired by the windows of New York skyscrapers at night. Maier has a good sense for what a city girl (one with a hefty bank account, naturally) needs, from that day-to-evening sleeveless dress to a statement coat (it doesn’t get bolder than his gold-dipped shearling bomber) to dressed-up yet unfussy tailoring. The best example of that was a suit in espresso brown stretch polyester, one part tuxedo and the other part track pants. A liquid gold evening dress with miles of fabric in its floor-length skirt had a similar sense of ease. There was more gold to be found on the collection’s accessories. Your average city girl might not really and truly need a leather clutch with hand-painted metallic edges, but we can think of plenty who’d desire it.
—Nicole Phelps
- Ter et Bantine
Our review will be posted shortly. See the complete collection by clicking the image at left.
- Cacharel
Following a convincing Spring debut, Cacharel’s new designers, Ling Liu and
Dawei Sun, are finding their footing at the storied French house. For
pre-fall, the duo is staying true to the label’s gamine DNA, but they aren’t
afraid to break a few rules. First, they jettisoned those signature Liberty
florals and replaced them with graphic, pixelated prints, which added a
welcome touch of modernity while maintaining brand identity. Liu and Sun
also demonstrated their flair for tailoring with subtle, asymmetric seaming
that gave comfortable jersey shifts and cashmere-blend topcoats controlled
volume and interesting drape. You could imagine a girl meandering through
the Jardin du Luxembourg in many of these everyday looks, accessorizing them
with flat boots, berets, and chunky knit scarves.
Cacharel regularly sells alongside happening, contemporary Parisian lines
like Isabel Marant and Carven. But if the label is aiming to siphon off some
of that cool clientele, Liu and Sun are going to need to up the edginess
factor with more pieces like the slim jersey pants with pleated side pockets
and the peach fuzz-colored leather minidress here.
—Brittany Adams
- Yigal Azrouël
Our review will be posted shortly. See the complete collection by clicking the image at left.
- Akris
The sportiness of race cars inspired Akris‘ Albert Kriemler to go shorter, sleeker, sheerer, and sunnier for Spring, but he’s relaxed into his more restrained Swiss groove for his latest pre-collection. That sections of his new offering were divided into color-coded blocks called Steam, Wheat, and Steel should give you some idea. He was still thinking of travel, but of a less heart-in-your-mouth variety: The season’s inspiration came courtesy of the Trans-Siberian Railway and its stately journey, in days gone by, between Moscow and the Far East. (To set the appropriate mood, he shot the lookbook in Le Train Bleu, the nineteenth-century train car-turned-restaurant at the top of Bloomingdale’s.) The Trans-Siberian itself, and the views from it, provided the photo print that has become a house signature, here emblazoned on dresses, tops, and soft cashmere coats. Overall, fluid tailoring and smart outerwear (from almost-casual to full-on luxe in natural mink) defined this quietly elegant collection. The Akris woman travels business class, no doubt, but there’s more than enough here to exercise her imagination.
—Matthew Schneier
- Jean Paul Gaultier
Our review will be posted shortly. See the complete collection by clicking the image at left.
- Valentino
A conversation with Pier Paolo Piccioli and Maria Grazia Chiuri before the
presentation of their new couture collection for Valentino quickly took a turn for the metaphysical. “If you don’t think about fashion, you just do clothes,” said Piccioli. “Fashion needs culture or it becomes empty.” The duo found their cultural spine in the finest flowering of French thought, keying in on the eighteenth century’s Age of Enlightenment and particularly the return to “real” values that Rousseau endorsed in his State of Nature philosophy. “Couture is a real value,” Piccioli added. “It’s not superficial.”
But it was Marie Antoinette role-playing in her little farm on the grounds of Versailles who provided the collection’s ambience. The first model seemed to arrive in the salons of the Hôtel Salomon de Rothschild on a breath of cool country air. Sprigged flower prints covered almost everything. An antique fabric alchemy transformed taffeta into equally antique-looking blurred floral chaîne. The sense of precious old artisanship was also evident in the swirling bouilloné decoration. The volumes were diaphanous, bucolic, like the cloud of point d’esprit scattered with organza lace cutouts. The designers sought a “deep lightness.” It was beautifully exemplified in dresses with up to five layers of lace and organza.
Examined up close in the atelier, the workmanship defied comprehension. The stitching was so fine it was invisible. It signaled the heart-stopping delicacy that distinguished the collection. But there was a real resilience, too. Hence the use of cotton amidst the lace, organza,
and filigree, as in a coat with tone-on-tone embroidery that felt embossed. Hence also the flat shoes, which loaned their own kind of grace to the purity of an ivory coat dress decorated with tiny spirals (Piccioli compared them to stucco). A chaîne skirt had deep, useful pockets. Smocking was a rustic detail. There was a casual quality that made the clothes ultimately feel more modern than their long-sleeved, high-necked, and lace-gloved propriety would at first suggest.
Chiuri pointed out that she and Picciolo come from an accessories background, where they learned to tell a big story with a small object. That skill is now writ large in the collections they are designing at Valentino. Today’s story was their most exquisite yet.
—Tim Blanks
- Maxime Simoens
Dressing Beyoncé for the cover of her album can do a lot for a designer’s front row. Beth Ditto was whooping it up in Maxime Simoens‘ audience today, perhaps shopping for an outfit of her own for her upcoming release. The quotient of influential editors in attendance was higher, too.
Simoens, a cinema buff, traded in last season’s Nosferatu inspiration for a film of a more recent vintage, Gaspard Noé’s Tokyo-set piece Enter the Void. But despite the decades separating the movies, the two collections were consistent, with slim silhouettes and graphic embellishments dominating both. If the mosaic-like tiles on a long strapless dress and a structured short-sleeve jacket didn’t quite evoke the “entirely new take on contemporary Japan” that the show notes augured, there was promise in Simeons’ vibrantly color-blocked mousseline dresses. And it was likewise refreshing to see a designer using embroidery—in this case nail-head studs on black crepe—in a forward-looking way.
As for Ditto, we can see her rocking one of Simoens’ fitted cocktail dresses. Their organza wings will come in handy for stage-diving.
—Nicole Phelps
- John Galliano
Now why do you think Bill Gaytten chose Tippi Hedren as the inspiratrice for Galliano’s pre-fall collection? The glacial Hitchcock blonde represented consummate grace under pressure, even when angry birds were tearing at her flesh. There must have been plenty of moments over the past half-year when this designer knew exactly how she felt.
Of course, there’s a simpler explanation. Utter the words “Hitchcock blonde” and visions of immaculate tailoring and precise elegance spring to mind. And that’s just what Gaytten was after with his dressy looks pulled together with head scarves and gloves. The hip-shaped jacket with a pleated neckline belted over a pencil skirt was typical. Trompe l’oeil scarf detailing added some old Hollywood swank to a coat that was already glamorous in crocodile jacquard.
Old-school screen glamour is a Galliano staple. Here, it was evoked with liberal use of gold lamé, guipure lace, and the bias-cut gowns that are the label’s signature item. A polka-dot devoré was particularly striking. Once again, Gaytten proved that he’s the one true keeper of the Galliano flame, but you can’t help wondering what he’s got up his own sleeve.
—Tim Blanks