Valentino holds black tie Paris show, Lanvin goes simple
PARIS (AP) – Cars dropping off countless VIPs for Valentino’s “black tie” show at Paris Fashion Week halted for blocks as the lights of Paris bathed the nearby Arc de Triomphe in the evening. Its designer Pierpaolo Piccioli put together a star-studded collection that deconstructed suits between androgyny and sartorial plays.
Meanwhile at Lanvin, stars like Avril Lavigne sat under Gothic-style arches to view the oldest couture house’s latest designs that subtly evoked history.
Here are some glimpses of the ready-to-wear display on Sunday.
valentino black tie
Brooklyn Beckham and Nicole Peltz soaked up photographers’ flashes inside the ornate Hotel Salomon de Rothschild in a moment of calm before the storm. Then as the night hit 8 p.m., hordes of fashion insiders battled for their spots at one of the most anticipated shows of the Paris season.
This fall, Piccioli captured the sexually fluid zeitgeist with a performance that dissected the suit—with black tie, punk glitter, and gold earrings.
Sheer black blouse with large white polka dots. A white shirt and black tie became a fully covered floor-sweeping gown. Numerous feathers jutted out deftly from the black and white striped feather coat.
Thin black ties – the theme of the show – were abundant, as were white shirt takes that at times caught echoes of Celine’s Hedi Slimane.
Yet the monochromatic thinking was handled with subtlety, and balanced with bursts of on-trend eye-popping color—like a long wool citrine coat or an emerald green leather poncho-jacket.
art of invitation
The age of email and growing environmental awareness seem to have left little to no impression on the fashion industry’s antiquated system of invitations. Season after season, gasoline-guzzling couriers are invited to crisscross Paris to personally deliver the ever-elaborate, often handmade – sometimes even putting on a show promoting ecological awareness!
Top houses vie for the wackiest or most imaginative idea which often gives a clue as to the theme of the runway collection.
Balenciaga’s invitation was a toile blazer against a plain background that fashion insiders interpreted as a sign of a new beginning for embattled designer Demna Gvasalia. Balenciaga apologized last year following harsh industry-wide criticism of its ads, which included child abuse papers and bondage bears. Gvasalia has told the media that he was now going back to his roots of making jackets, as that is where he started as a designer, modestly admitting that fashion was not about “buzz”.
Givenchy sent a huge patent black Croc purse with details to the show that went in a glamorous direction.
Whereas, Chloe’s invitation box of Alain Ducasse designer cocoa chocolates was intended to sweeten guests’ post-sweets review?
lanvin is simple
1940s, 1980s 18th century, medieval and renaissance references come together inside the historic arches of the 13th century College of Bernardines in Paris. Yet despite these myriad styles, this fall-winter collection remained a modest affair – simply chic, and a deliberate lack of embellishments and embellishments.
There were some nice touches. Polka-dots like studs in shirts, slit skirt-suits and coats provided lift. Elsewhere, a pink 1940s coat with sloping shoulders became a statement piece in textured pink. The back decoration in a black satin gown featured a diagonal dynamic, cleverly matching the angle of the stone arch.
The simplicity of the show belied the inner passion of Lanvin’s designer Bruno Cialelli. House quotes the Swedish-American sculptor Claes Oldenburg, who died last year, as saying: “How fun it is to make things! And the things being made, go away!”
Alexander McQueen’s Orchid
Designer Sarah Burton said she was drawn to the orchid, the leitmotif of her gothic-tinged fall collection for Alexander McQueen, because of its strange beauty and adaptability.
“It thrives in the wind, resists taking root and grows in the wild,” he said. “The orchid mimics both predator and prey.”
The anatomy of orchids – and human flesh – was dissected in this original display that transformed the beauty of one of the world’s most common flowers into something almost menacing, frightening and provocative.
The orchid inside is shown as a blown white image on a black billowing Asiatic look skirt. Taken from above, the lips and stem of the flower resembled a fierce creature, mouth open, ready to eat.
Giger-like mustaches in a lofty sheath in torch red exposed innumerable orchid roots creeping around the bust and hips.
Front row stars Eddie Redmayne and Elle Fanning praised and applauded.
