From the trash bag dresses of Vaquera along grimy Cortlandt Alley, to swathes of satin at the Lincoln Center and a curtain yanked by Tom Ford, New York Fashion Week celebrated the return of live shows even as it exposed some of the growing faultlines in fashion.
In London, bodycon dresses and cutouts vied with silk ruffles and sumptuous gowns, as designers drew inspiration from Last Year at Marienbad, Pina Bausch and Joan Didion, the Royal Ballet, and the British Olympic diving team. And in Milan, the headlines went to Versace, with a runway show featuring Dua Lipa, Naomi Campbell, Lourdes Leon, and Emily Ratajkowski, before the pop-up collection Fendace saw Donatella Versace collaborate with Silvia Venturini Fendi and Kim Jones.
So on to Paris, and the climax of the spring-summer 2022 season. The return of audiences to the French capital created a buzz around fashion week for the first time in eighteen months. A packed schedule saw Chanel, Dior, Saint Laurent, and Louis Vuitton showcase their wares alongside relative newcomers like Thebe Magugu, Kenneth Ize, and Rok Hwang. But there was no jostling for space, as models walked en plein air and fashion houses returned to familiar haunts.
Some brands still stuck with digital presentations. In one of the first shows of Paris Fashion Week, the designer Marine Serre created the video Ostal 24 with her usual collaborators Sacha Barbin and Ryan Doubiago, upcycling embroidered tablecloths, linen tea towels, and vintage denim within the ample confines of a French country house. Flowing smocks and jewellery made out of cutlery adorned the models as they embarked on their pastoral routine, with morning yoga and solo dancing giving way to a crimson dyeing ritual by dusk.
Paul Smith put on a small personal presentation down the Rue des Archives, while the South African designer Thebe Magugu based his collection around the idea of ‘memory as a reservoir for optimism’, showing sculpted knits and plenty of sharp tailoring while poring over old family photographs in the company of his mother and aunt.
The first runway show of the week had already commenced over at Kenneth Ize, who debuted in Paris last year just before the curtain dropped on the pandemic. The Nigerian designer has a weaving factory in the Kwara capital of Ilorin, which produces around 80 percent of his fabrics, and his spring-summer collection showed a dazzling array of silks and prints.
At Dior, Maria Grazia Chiuri dived back into the sixties, drawing from Italian discothèques, period board games, and the designs of Marc Bohan, which are currently on display as part of a retrospective at the Brooklyn Museum. The result was colourful display of mini dresses, tailored coats, and Mary Janes which drew the attention of Jisoo from Blackpink. And from a tent in the Tuileries Garden to a series of strobe lights under the watchful eye of the Eiffel Tower, at Saint Laurent the creative director Anthony Vaccarello dedicated his show to Paloma Picasso, with broad-shouldered jackets, spandex jumpsuits, and red leather gloves all reaching towards a watery climax.
On the grass of the Bois de Vincennes, the Courrèges creative director Nicolas Di Felice focused on festival wear, with ponchos and flared leggings as he seeks to breath new life into the heritage brand. Acne Studios mixed things up with sheer tops, buckled skirts, and leather corsets over beats from the Venezuelan producer Arca. And Rick Owens returned through plumes of smoke to the Palais de Tokyo, where Michèle Lamy heralded a billowing assortment of laddered knitwear and tulle fabric, draped over the top of cutaway bodysuits, leather patches, and reptilian platform boots.
For her first physical show as the creative director of Chloé, the Uruguayan designer Gabriela Hearst gathered spectators on the Quai de la Tournelle along the banks of the River Seine for a collection of tasseled gowns, comfortable pantsuits, and crocheted dresses which paid heed to the environment. As the brand transitions towards low-impact and sustainable fabrics, linen is gradually replacing cotton, and buying strategies emphasise the upcycled and handmade, with the soles of the sandals and flip-flops in Paris produced in collaboration with Ocean Sole, a social enterprise which removes trash from the waterways of Kenya.
Through the pines, Jonathan Anderson of Loewe drew inspiration from the exaggerated elegance of Mannerism, with surreal silhouettes which jutted out at the waist, flared at the knees, or exposed the chest through pink plastic resin. Many of the models wore metallic breastplates, while stilettos skewered household objects like bars of soap, birthday candles, and cracked eggshells.
It was a case of the slouchier the better for Raf Simons, who reimagined the workplace through a collection of unisex suits and oversize dress shirts. Valentino took over the old marketplace at the Carreau du Temple, where Pierpaolo Piccioli launched the Valentino Archive alongside swathes of chocolate brown, royal purple, and yellow taffeta. And over at the Théâtre du Châtelet, Demna Gvasalia of Balenciaga conducted his own film premiere, as celebrities like Isabelle Huppert, Cardi B, and Eliot Page strode the red carpet, with their looks screened to the audience inside before the assembled cast settled down for a special Balenciaga-themed episode of The Simpsons.
Cartoons were also in vogue at Lanvin, which collaborated with DC Comics to incorporate illustrations from old issues of Batman. Hermès opted for a sleeker and more natural look, as Nadège Vanhee-Cybulski added leather detailing to athletic crop tops, boiler suits, and wide-legged trousers, against a sunset backdrop specially staged within the confines of a private airport hangar. Meanwhile the mixture of luxury and utility courted controversy at Givenchy, which received criticism for its noose necklaces in silver and gold.
That left the final day of Paris Fashion Week, where Chanel combined swimsuits and mesh skirts, tweeds and pastel cardigan suits, and sequins and diaphanous butterfly prints, all on an elevated runway which was illuminated by the flashbulbs of in-house photographers Inez and Vinoodh. Miu Miu shrunk office attire down to the barest of essentials. And at Louis Vuitton, the designer Nicolas Ghesquière continued to mine the past, with reveries under the grand chandeliers of the Passage Richelieu in the Louvre rudely interrupted by a climate protester who stormed the runway, bearing a sign which read ‘Overconsumption = Extinction’.
All the pent-up emotion and careful consideration over the future of fashion wound down with a tribute to Alber Elbaz. The Israeli designer, who became known for his effortless chic and carnivalesque runway shows over the course of fourteen years at Lanvin, died in April at the age of 59 years old. The final show of Paris Fashion Week saw the leading lights of the industry join forces with his old design team at AZ Factory, with his longtime partner Alex Koo explaining ‘We wanted to find a way to celebrate Alber’s spirit’.
From Bruno Sialelli, the current creative director at Lanvin, to Maria Grazia Chiuri, Jean Paul Gaultier, and Ralph Lauren, forty-five top designers paid homage to Elbaz in a show loosely based on the Théâtre de la Mode, the touring exhibit of miniature mannequins which brought the French fashion industry together in the immediate aftermath of World War II.
Dries Van Noten and Olivier Rousteing incorporated caricatures of Elbaz into their designs, Thebe Magugu and Daniel Roseberry reimagined vintage pieces, while Pierpaolo Piccioli and Demna Gvasalia offered riffs on his signature hearts and hot pink ruffles. Finally Amber Valletta emerged in a velvet bow tie as the embodiment of the late designer, before the sounds of the 1972 hit O’Jays single ‘Love Train’ brought the evening to a wrap.
