Paris couture round-up

[tillyjoyceさん]

At around the same time Donatella Versace’s Atelier Versace opened couture,
tens of thousands of Greek people were congregating in Athens, the rowdy
manifestation of a No vote that had seen them rejecting the austerity plan
proposed by their European creditors. Cocooned among the fashion press in Paris,
surrounded by the world’s most sumptuous dresses and exclusive clientele, the
extremes of economic scale were bizarrely illuminated. Was there a significance
to be found in the shredded goddess gowns at the show’s centre? At times
Donatella’s modern Aphrodite, classically beautiful but a little broken, seemed
an appropriate metaphor for the condition of the ancient capital. But at
couture, any resemblance to persons living or dead is mere coincidence. The only
narrative is fantasy.

Versace, so fluent in the sartorial language of glamour, had opted out of her
comfort zone, offering a gentler muse dressed in sugary pastels and layers of
chiffons that had been hand-combed to look almost like ostrich feathers. “I call
it impeccable imperfection,” she said of the collection’s distressed appearance.
It was not so fragile as it looked, however. Skirts made from whisper-thin fil
coupé, and embroidered with flowers, fell from tough, transparent corsets — like
breastplates — decorated with narrow boning. A baby-pink dress in double
georgette with long fluted sleeves and a short flippy skirt was studded with
silver staples. The most ambitious piece, a chainmail gown with raggedly
beautiful lace inserts and floral cords, had taken 600 hours to complete: a
knockout piece of sartorial engineering.

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Versace’s soft romantic take on femininity set the tone for a week in which
dreamy etherealism informed many of the collections. Some called it the
Valentino effect. The Italian house designed by Maria Grazia Chiuri and
Pierpaolo Piccioli staged its collection in Rome, outside the schedule, but the
aesthetic established so successfully by the duo in their seven years at
Valentino echoed in many of the Paris shows, from the limpid draping at Bouchra
Jarrar to the golden fairytale laces at Elie Saab.

No surprise it was most clearly felt at Schiaparelli, where new designer
Bertrand Guyon arrived in April from Valentino couture. His debut collection
instilled a softness at the house famed for its surrealist quirks. In his hands,
the Schiaparelli codes — the Dali eye, the shocking pink, the painted faces and
the bold silhouettes — were still in evidence, but handled with caution. It was
an encouraging show for a house that has struggled with its quixotic legacy.

At Dior, Raf Simons had looked to the “garden of earthly delights” for
inspiration, and his collection recalled Hieronymus Bosch, the Puritan Flemish
masters and the gentle French impressionists — often all at once. A simple white
chiffon gown opened the show, followed by cashmere cloaks, worn like medieval
mantles and set with a single fur sleeve. A voluminous pitch black taffeta coat,
as might become a Van Dyck portrait, was followed by pointillist silk dresses,
hand-painted or embroidered with tiny feathers. Lusty velvet coats with
exaggerated sleeves were paired with giant corduroy flares. (Corduroy at
couture! Whatever next?) At first, I found Dior confusing and unfocused. I
wanted it edited to fewer ideas. Yet, in the days since, I have studied it again
and again, each time finding something new to enjoy.

Karl Lagerfeld and Kendall Jenner may have staged a wedding but there was
little whimsy at casino Chanel, for which the Grand Palais was transformed into
a gambling den, lined with Chanelified slot machines. Film stars Isabelle
Huppert, Julianne Moore and Kristen Stewart perched at poker tables while models
traversed a pit furnished with a bespoke Chanel carpet.

The set proved quite the distraction — even though it felt a bit “couture in
Macau” (where Chanel has three stores, incidentally) and rather sterile in
atmosphere. Perhaps the recreation was simply too authentic? No matter: a keen
eye could still admire the house’s new manufacturing technique, “selective laser
sintering” — a form of melding in which powdered metal is transformed into a 3D
material.

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Here, it was used to reimagine the classic tweed suit, now laser soldered
into a heavy-metal mesh, on to which the tweed effect was painted or
embroidered. A baffling technology, it was described in the show notes as being
“mainly used for low-volume production”. Big stakes, high tech, low volume:
that’s modern couture for you.

No sintering, but lots more melding at Maison Margiela, where John Galliano
was playing with hybrids: Madagascan raffia mixed with neoprene, English tweed
with Moroccan pom-poms, crochet panels with patent leather. So were the clothes
themselves mutant: a lace coat was furnished with bright blue gauntlets
repurposed from a pair of velvet trousers. A strapless dress was redrawn from a
double-breasted jacket and artlessly draped at the back. There were quilt skirts
and tapestry dresses stitched from vintage needlepoints. The collection had a
lighter touch than Galliano’s first show for the house, in January. This was
easier. And there was humour, too: one dress had been a potato sack in a
previous life.

Shocking pink and black velvet underscored Armani Privé, in which jackets,
pinched high on the shoulder, skimmed the body, and bustier dresses were spun
with Swarovski crystals. Black velvet was key also at Jean Paul Gaultier, in
which the galette was a central motif (guests were served pancakes to drive the
point home), and nautical details cruised throughout. At Giambattista Valli, a
tailored silhouette was volumised with sculptural ruffles, and a giant rippling
ball gown in neon orange won the award for most extravagant skirt.

The most astonishing show, however, was Fendi Haute Fourrure: the house’s
first couture outing and the week’s grande finale. Staged in the Théâtre des
Champs-Elysées, and set to Stravinsky’s Rite of Spring, Lagerfeld’s debut fur
collection featured 30 looks, each a wizardry of craftsmanship. Furs were
fashioned into flowers and feathers, striated over latex and conjured into ovoid
silhouettes that shimmered with expense. One sable coat, every follicle
silverised to look as though cast in moonlight, costs an estimated €1m. At
Fendi, impeccable perfection ruled the day, and the week closed with a roar of
approval from an audience for whom no less will do.