Thrashin’ Fashion: The End

by Laia Garcia

Paris. Paris Fashion Week was upon us and now it’s over. Realistically speaking, give or take a few fashion shows in each city, Fashion Week could just take place in Paris and it would be more than enough. Paris is still the center of fashion, and no matter how much we in New York want to believe that we’re the center, we are not. I’m fine with this. So much goes on in Paris, it’s almost like three or four or five fashion weeks all in one. It would be very easy to turn a recap of what happened in Paris into its own novella, but I’ll try not to go that far.

There is no realer spectacle than a Chanel fashion show. Every season–and I do mean every season, including the seasons like resort and cruise where most designers just release a lookbook–Chanel whisks editors away to an exotic location, literally, or via insanely extravagant set design, but people get whisked nonetheless.

Editors arrived at the location and the set was built like the streets of Paris, the show happened, EIGHTY looks, as is their custom. When you send that many looks out, you’re bound to have a few hits. Keep in mind the average fashion show features half as many.

So now that you know my general feelings towards Karl Lagerfeld’s reign at Chanel *cough*retire*cough* I can tell you what you might already know if you are a person on social media [Ed. Note: or if you read Meredith’s piece from yesterday!], which is that at the end of his show, there was a staged “feminist protest”. Models carried signs saying things such as “FREE FREEDOM” and “FEMINIST NOT MASOCHIST” and “BOYS SHOULD GET PREGNANT TOO” (ok, maybe that last one is actually a good one).

The whole thing was stupidly hilarious, because of course Karl Lagerfeld would try to co-opt feminism. Sure, you could get mad about it, but who has time? I am a busy woman trying to have it all and having it all certainly does not include being mad about someone’s reflection of current culture as a way to insert themselves into the conversation. It is nothing more and nothing less. Except for the fact that there were a lot of pantsuits, there was nothing “feminist” about the collection.

Everyone in attendance died over the display on Instagram, as was expected, but I wish that the fashion community, being as smart as I know a lot of them are, would’ve called a spade and spade instead of, as my good friend Cher Horowitz once said, trying to find meaning in a Pauly Shore movie. (I have seen Clueless enough to think of ourselves as bffs). The point is, it was a cute show. Give the models megaphones! Make up some dumb signs! If they had burned logo’d tweed bras tho…THEN it would’ve meant something.

If you’re asking yourself, “what does feminist fashion even look like?”, then I get you, but also, I have an answer for you. It’s three little french words: Comme des Garcons. I don’t know if Rei Kawakubo identifies as feminist or not, but also I don’t really care and the whole thing is irrelevant, because no label has ever been such a consistent middle finger to society, the patriarchy, and the world. This season she went dark with a Little Red Riding Hood motif. You might think that’s innocent and sweet, but Rei went dark as fuck; in her world, the wolf is scared of the Little Red. Particularly when Little Red wears tattered tunics strung with roses, deconstructed jackets, and ruffled extravaganzas that pre-empt the wolf-attack-aesthetic before he even gets a chance at her. His impending destruction is her source of power and, by pulling the ole’ switcheroo, the thing that will inevitably scare the wolf away.

The collection was tightly edited and almost wholly red, save for the two looks where the red was a blood scatter pattern over voluminous, geometric, enveloping, white silhouettes. No other article of clothing can so literally proclaim “I am woman hear me roar”. Rei remains, and always will be, the absolute queen.

At Celine, Phoebe Philo, another type of queen–the one who you can thank for most of the offerings at your local Zara–said she was inspired by another-other-reigning queen of the world, Kate Bush. Particularly her song “This Woman’s Work”, a song written about a weird birthing scene in a John Hughes movie (I just learned all this through Wikipedia). So that was ostensibly Phoebe’s inspiration, and I clicked through the slideshow while listening to the song, but I do not think it made a difference. Also I did not get a lot of birthing vibes from the collection.

That’s fine; I still loved it. The thing about Phoebe — the thing that would, perhaps, classify her as feminist not that I know if she identifies as such, but again, it doesn’t really matter — is that ever since she came on board at Celine at few years ago she has done 100% her own thing, no matter what was going on with the outside world. Of course, now the outside world sees her as a guide, but you can always tell that her next move comes from within herself.

So what does “This Woman’s Work” mean when it comes to clothes? It means simplicity and comfort and unfortunately it also means the ugliest shoes I have ever seen walk down a runway in my life. It’s fine, we can ignore the shoes for a season. Above the ankles, and at the shoulders, arms, and waist, there were cutouts, a slight nod towards sex appeal. The rest of the clothes were boxy and layered and not at all pieces part of the classically sexy canon. There were frayed edges, ruffled layers, and perfectly round cutouts at the sternum that gave way to a busy flower print, very much against the spirit of minimalist Celine, and yet somehow it worked. How do you make a floral print minimalist? You can’t, really, but there’s no way that you could call a maxi, boxy all-over printed shift dress maximalist either.

The collection was weirdly sexual in its, well, weirdness. When the last look came out, a long black tunic with circular cutouts at the waist and hips layered over white wide leg trousers, you felt like there was a new version of yourself out there waiting for you to explore. Like you needed to wear this clothes now to get in touch with this new part of yourself. This is what makes Phoebe and Celine so successful. It’s a cliché to say something like, “she knows what women want before the women themselves do”, or whatever, but it wouldn’t be a cliché if it weren’t true. So I’m just left here thinking about what kind of a Laia I would be if I wore clothes with cutouts, because I think it would be a better version of me, and I wanna meet that girl.

Speaking of wide layered pieces, designers Humberto Leon and Carol Lim (better known as the masterminds behind uber-store Opening Ceremony) have begun a real renaissance of Japanese label Kenzo since they took over as creative directors. This season, they pulled out all the stops for what felt like their first truly directional collection since they took over in 2011.

Their first look, an oversized zip-up jacket paired with a pair off wide leg jeans best described as “JNCO’s-on-steroids”, was surprisingly cool and not at all reminiscing of regrettable rave trends of yesteryear. An oversized short-sleeve lace white shirt layered over a long sleeve shirt of the same fabric, worn with a below-the knee denim skirt and weirdo black brogue-inspired shoes, seemed equal parts Victorian and modern, like a girl who’s been given so much freedom in her life that she chooses to rebel by dressing conservatively.

For a couple of years now I have been joking about who will be the next designer to bring back JNCO’s, and although my money was on Alexander Wang (because, duh), this seems like the best possible outcome of an inevitable situation; make them wider, make them slouchier, make them a maxi skirt, basically, and then just groove on with the casual vibes of the surf and sea.

At Jacquemus, casual surf vibes came in via the south of France, with their cute striped cabanas and stuff. The first look, a white asymmetrical, cropped, half-button down shirt, was paired with matching loose trousers and white socks worn with all-white Adidas shell toes. The look was super fresh, but it was the striped red bikini peeking out from underneath that truly made the whole outfit cool. These were the building blocks for the entire collection.

Elsewhere, triangle bikini tops were worn over oversized button-down shirts, or the shirts themselves were tweaked to slope off-the-shoulders just so, exposing a striped tankini underneath. The clothes were immensely wearable and very “now”, the kind of clothes that make you want to change your lifestyle (aka move to the south of France).

Halfway through the show, the previous cabana-stripes on the cute little bikinis became sculptural pieces that wrapped around the body with little concern for the concept of “clothes.” My favorite piece was a kicky lil’ blue and white combo that seemed like someone had just found out they had a party to go to, and, with nothing to wear, they spy a roll of cabana canvas sitting in the corner and wrap it around themselves. A beachside Scarlett O’Hara moment, if you will. To complete the cool look, all the models had imperfectly-perfect post-swimming hair, worn to one side, over the shoulder, like all cool sirens do.

Other arts n’ crafts projects appeared on the Loewe runway, where designer Jonathan Anderson made his womenswear debut. Anderson is a young designer who, in past seasons, has pushed the weird and beautiful all the way into my heart under his namesake label. Like a good Carrie Bradshow, I couldn’t help but wonder if the weird and the beautiful would make an appearance here as well. Did it ever.

Loewe is best known for their use of sumptuous leathers and skins, which Anderson explored and exploited in nearly magical ways: a golden honey suede dress was haphazardly appliquéd with matching pieces of suede, like a schoolgirl project gone terribly wrong (right). A black ensemble featured a collage of long multi-colored leather and suede swatches at the chest, with just the right vaginal suggestion. His signature look was a pair of brightly colored wide-leg trousers, in what looked like the softest leather ever, tied with a long kimono-style sash at the hips and worn with slightly shrunken tees, matching leather tops, tight little sweaters. Each for a different kind of woman, for sure, but all within that weird and beautiful brain of Anderson’s.

My number one favorite brain belongs to Nicolas Ghesquiere, former designer of Balenciaga and current designer at Louis Vuitton. This is his second season and I have never wished I was part of the 1% as much as I do when I look at his work. A white, intricately knit, turtleneck mini-dress opened the show and if that sounds sweet and dainty, it was somehow not. Maybe it was because it was worn with slick black boots; maybe it was the cool black ribbon that was threaded and then let loose through the neck; probably it was all of the above. It was another instance of reinterpreting the 1970s, but the way we did the 1970s in the 1990s, which makes it a reinterpretation of a reinterpretation.

The same white dress that opened the show appeared later on the runway, this time done up in what I think is black-lacquered leather. The sex appeal of that dress has not been seen since Beyoncé danced on a fainting chair for Jay-Z.

As the show progressed, the silhouettes got a little looser, a little more Almost Famous-y and then — BOOM — we were in velvet land: matching rusted maroon and dusty purple velvet trousers and bras, flower printed velvets that bring to mind that ugly couch your grandma kept under plastic wraps, except that, somehow, that’s exactly what you want to drape yourself in.

At Balenciaga, Ghesquiere pushed every boundary, seemingly always thinking about futuristic dressing. There was always something about his clothes that seemed advanced, which is why it’s so interesting to see him think about things to wear right now, to think about women in a way that reflects their humanity as opposed to their cyborg-ness.

Perhaps no one else plays with the tension of what women want to wear now vs. their idealized version of a “future” woman quite like designer Chitose Abe at Sacai. Abe is best known for creating hybrids in previous collections: pants with skirts attached, jackets that look like you’re wearing three jackets. This season, the “obvious” looks (which were no less amazing), gave way to a near-perfect collection.

It started with a floral chiffon sleeveless ruffled top, worn with a matching wrap skirt, a classic take on cocktail dressing, except the top was “interrupted” by appliquéd striped of military jacket pockets at the breast and waist. From then on it was a battle of floral and military: a little navy army sweater over a floral dress, a hybrid dress that features a navy knitted bodice with appliquéd army green pockets and belt and a floral chiffon skirt surrounded with what looks like an opened army jacket. Slowly the military vibes win over the floral chiffon (just like real life, let’s just go ahead and say it). Re-imagined military jackets worn with sheer white turtlenecks and quilted skirts, all in army green, showed up.

As the collection progressed, the navy, green, and white palette developed a slightly 1970s geometric print. The print gives way to navy lace, which swarms around a military shirt dress with patch pockets at the breast and hips. From then on, it’s an explosion of lace, chiffon, stripes and plaids all layered over each other: sometimes the lace wins and sometimes the army green canvas wins and sometimes they all seem to live together in harmony.

I’ve not seen a collection of clothes with such a narrative. Each look in its precise order seems to mean something different. That’s not to say that this is the only way these clothes can live, of course, because in the end it was an insanely beautiful collection full of clothes anyone would love to wear. It’s just that it’s really incredible when after sitting and clicking through god-knows-how-many shows, there is one where there is a purpose to actually staging one. Sacai may still be a small label in the grand scheme of things, but in the end, I think it was one of the clearest statements about where fashion is right now and where it will be next season.

And so it’s the end, my friends, the end of this dear fashion season. But fear not! Pre-fall starts in just a couple of months; after all, we can’t just sit here, satisfied by what we’ve just seen forever, can we?

Laia Garcia is a writer and stylist based in Brooklyn. One time, Chris Kraus made her cry.