MOSCHINO ROYAL PUNK
Beauty looks at the Milan Fashion Week reached new heights when Bella and Gigi Hadid, walked the Moschino fall 2020 catwalk sporting baroque, pastel-toned wigs inspired by Marie-Antoinette.
Interpreting creative director Jeremy Scott’s intention to mix the 18th-century inspiration with a rock vibe, hair stylist Paul Hanlon played the modern Léonard-Alexis Autié the famed hairdresser behind the eccentric looks of the French Queen and created the intricate wigs, which required a week of work. Continue reading
FENDI FINALLY ALONE
Silvia Venturini Fendi is in charge now, and on Thursday night she put inclusivity front and center on the Fendi runway with more sizes (Paloma Elsesser) and ages (Carolyn Murphy and Karen Elson), marking a new era for the house.
Fendi said backstage, explaining that for her second collection working as a solo act following Lagerfeld’s death last February she wanted to think about “the woman I want to dress strong, independent and free, but within the traditional codes of femininity.”
That meant drawing inspiration from boudoir and silver screen femme fatales, including those Lagerfeld himself costumed for the Seventies film, “Maitresse.”
On the runway, the focus was on curvy women, if not literally, on making them so by using puffed and padded sleeves, nipped and corseted waists on brushed gray flannel coats and blazers, pink satin and velvet dresses that were the film noir, covered-up side of seductive.
For evening, more revealing lingerie looks came out to play, with satin, bustier and fringe details, worn with pumps with garter ankle straps, and coquettish back-of-the-headbands that looked like a trend in the making. Continue reading
GUCCI A FASHION CAROUSEL
Smart and real, Michele was humbly asking you to come to the show, if you didn’t have anything better to do. From the thoughtful invitation to the warm welcome, the entrance was directly backstage where makeup was in progress and the designer was greeting everybody.
Life is a carousel, and when it begins to turn, time seems long, and the days are whirling around in a whirlwind. It is the time of childhood, the beginning of the youth of illusions, love and hope. That’s Mitchell’s message?
As in fairy tales, everything is beautiful and seems enchanted, like the carousel, with the pretty colours of a world full of splendour. Come and let’s enter the magical land Gucci tells us and invites us to share the gaiety of the 70s.
It’s not about showing a story, but rather a time that passes like a story stopped in a painting. This time is not the duration but rather the time to celebrate Zeno’s arrow and its paradoxes. It is in the interval from one position to another that the viewer can judge this wear and tear exposed in a painting. But it is also what implies the reversal of thought as Aristotle did in his time. Continue reading
AMSTERDAM HEADKAISER
“Embrace the present and invent the future,” one of his famous quotes, is writ large in the atrium, a mantra for the 150-plus employees here who are nimbly propelling his namesake house into one of the fastest-growing brands in fashion.
Retail sales of all Karl Lagerfeld products reached 700 million euros last year, and the brand should cross the 1 billion euro threshold within the next two years, according to Pier Paolo Righi, the executive who partnered with Lagerfeld nine years ago to establish his name in the “masstige” zone with a digital-first thrust.
Almost one year after the death of the legendary designer, the company is brimming with youthful energy the average age of employees is 30 and a slate of new projects, from an underwear range to a collection of fragrances inspired by some of Lagerfeld’s favorite destinations.
“We always look into what was Karl’s favorite,” Kim said, showing off a mood board for pre-fall 2020 full of images of Biarritz, the seaside town in France where Lagerfeld frolicked and occasionally vacationed in his younger years.
EMILIA WICKSTEAD LONDON 2020
BECKHAM SCHOOL UNIFORM
After last season’s oversized extravaganza, Victoria Beckham reined it in with a collection that took in shorter lengths and nodded to school uniforms in traditional tweeds, checks.
The designer took Penelope Tree and the ever-cool Marisa Berenson as her inspirations, pairing her tweed, plaid or dark wool A-line skirts and culottes with high, thigh-gripping leather boots. She sliced a few inches off her trousers, too, teaming them with long, tailored jackets and more high boots with gently curving heels.
I like how a sexy, tight boot feels and I think it is a strong statement. It toughens the look up, pointing to the ruching effect on the leg of her new boots with their curvy “banana” heels.
Other proportions were shorter, too, as in thigh-skimming tunic dresses with billowy or cape sleeves, and shapely shirtdresses done in a lumberjack plaid. The clutch of slim, cleavage-flashing black dresses that opened the show , will give Beckham’s loyal customers options, and keep them coming back for more. Continue reading
CALL ME MARC THE GOOD GUY
Jacobs is an extraordinary designer, his part showmanship. Over the years, he has staged some incredibly engaging shows, the kind now called “experiential.” This was a museum-worthy performance-art piece one that would sell a lot of tickets.
It’s ‘Drastic-Classicism, which we took from Karole, during a late-night preview, referring to the dancer’s 1981 work of the same name.
Less obvious, a pink and blue evening-bedecked twosome looked like grown-up glam versions of the creepy twins of “The Shining.” “It’s more the idea of age and stages in our careers, fashion designers, people who love fashion, people we have always admired, the things we return to, the things we revisit.”
jacobs characterized the collection as joyful, but differently so than last season’s over-the-top, maximalist romp. But the clothes were an in-depth treatise on sartorial refinement. There was so, so much there, all of it highly considered and impeccably crafted. Many, particularly the fabulous range of coats and jackets, could be called minimal. Continue reading
WHY MEDIA CENSORED MY BODY
I wasn’t shocked at the reaction I received from my t-shirt. I’m used to being told by society that I must regulate my body to fit the norm. I’m used to the fact that images of unaltered women fat are seen as unacceptable. Continue reading
PARIS FASHION CORONAVIRUS
The coronavirus has taken its toll on the Paris Fashion Week schedule: Masha Ma, Shiatzy Chen, Uma Wang, Jarel Zhang, Calvin Luo and Maison Mai have cancelled their planned events in the French capital because of the outbreak, organizers said on Tuesday.
La Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode, French fashion’s governing body, announced the cancellations as it gears up for the fall ready-to-wear shows and presentations, due to take place from Feb. 24 to March 3. Continue reading
GLOBAL ORGANIC TEXTILE
Kaitlyn Dever in a custom red Louis Vuitton strapless gown and stole made of GOTS (Global Organic Textile Standard) Taroni silk-satin embroidered with red-blue beads at the Vermont Atelier in Paris, certified according to the Oeko-Tex Standard 100 and approved by the Red Carpet Green Dress organization. Who knows what all that gobbledy-greengook means exactly, but it sounds good coming from a brand whose parent LVMH has faced criticism for not signing the United Nations' fashion industry charter for climate action.
Louis Vuitton designer Nicolas Ghesquière has had a banner red-carpet season, no doubt about it. On Sunday, he also dressed Lea Seydoux using certified ivory silk, and a new wood fiber textile developed by Tencel Luxe that will hit the market this May.
When you think about it, it’s tragic, but it’s part of the human condition. We really wasted our planet in a way, said Seydoux during a fitting at the Chateau Marmont earlier in the week, when the street was closed off so Oscars sponsor Cadillac could crane in a 2021 Escalade to sit poolside for a cocktail bash. Continue reading
R13 NEW YORK 2020
In 2009, Chris Leba launched R13, a cool-girl denim brand that can now be found at top retailers like Barneys, Shopbop and Totokaelo. Only, not a lot of people knew he was behind it, because until December, he had a full time job as a VP at Ralph Lauren. All press around the brand noted that it had an “anonymous” creative director, à la Margiela pre-Galliano. Continue reading
THEYSKENS NEW CREATIVE DIRECTOR AT AZZARO
Designer Olivier Theyskens has been appointed by fashion house Azzaro as the new creative director. Theyskens succeeds Maxime Simoëns, who has resigned the position of creative director to the brand last year.
Theyskens will show his first collection for the fashion house during the couture week in Paris from 5 to 9 July. “There is a style from the sixties and seventies that is clearly about sensual and beautiful femininity,”. The designer will use the heritage of the fashion house for inspiration and translate it into contemporary fashion.
When Theyskens was at the head of Rochas and Nina Ricci, he frequently used historical references in the garments. That the designer will do the same at Azzaro is therefore in line with expectations, and in 2016 he revived his own label of the same name. He will continue to design for this, says the designer .
HOLLYWOOD GIANT DIES AT 103
Sure, you can’t discuss Kirk Douglas without mentioning the chin. That famously dimpled chin, which you’d never believe on a statue, nonetheless gave the Hollywood icon a granite jaw that served him well as a leading man for more than 60 years. But you also have to give Douglas who died Wednesday at the age of 103 credit for those piercing eyes, which gave the Spartacus star his relentless intensity. The chin made him a star, but the eyes made him an actor.
Given the eyes and the jaw, Douglas was equally adept at playing heroes and cads. He rose to fame playing the latter, in movies like Out of the Past, Champion Ace in the Hole (as a scruple-free reporter), and Hollywood exposé The Bad and the Beautiful. But he soon moved to nobler, if equally volatile characters, in such films as 20,000 Leagues Under the Sea, The Vikings, Gunfight at the O.K. Corral , Lust for Life (where, as Vincent Van Gogh, he hid his dimple under a beard), Paths of Glory, and of course, Spartacus. Continue reading
NEWS FROM TIFFANY AND CO
When the luxury jeweler’s shareholders gathered at its New York headquarters Tuesday morning to vote on the mega sale to Arnault’s LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton, it was in all the important ways, already a done deal. (Arnault wasn’t on the scene, but later issued a statement praising the go-ahead of the transaction, the largest deal ever in the luxury space).
The meeting was a formality and little resistance was expected to the deal, struck in November at $135 a share. Investors holding about 72 percent of Tiffany’s stock were represented at the meeting, although the majority of those shares appeared to be voted by proxy.
In the room sipping free coffee, nibbling on croissants, chatting with chief executive officer Alessandro Bogliolo and reading over the rules of the meeting was an eclectic group of smaller shareholders and employees. Continue reading