Perched at the prow of Celine, Michael Rider, who is not the “Cup” but holds the cut, did not summon ghosts nor ask the hangers to whisper the secrets of his predecessors. No séance in the wardrobes. No turning tables between two clothing racks. No. Rider chose the most straightforward liturgy of contemporary fashion: to sell. To sell as one beats time. Wearable, profitable. The Lord will surely be pleased.
The kings of the deal, those cardinals of the payment terminal, have learned a simple truth: it is not the designer who has the last word. It is the commercial director of the corner at Bloomingdale’s, a discreet oracle between two racks of trench coats. There the fate of silhouettes is decided, somewhere between a cash register and a marketing-scented display, under the watchful trackside mother, Anna Wintour.
Rider applies the lesson with the precision of a cynical watchmaker. A collection concentrated like a tight espresso of potential best-sellers. Clothes designed for the rails of boutiques and the luminous rivers of TikTok, those new runways where the algorithm carries more power than a stern column in The New York Times or an editorial in Canal Luxe.
Effective? As efficient as a McDonald’s menu calibrated à la Balenciaga, served in viral capsules on TikTok.
For his third show at Celine, Michael Rider did not propose a vision. He installed a system. A gentle mechanism, lubricated with pragmatism.
According to the newspaper Les Échos, the clothes are magnificent, of course. Magnificently familiar. Perhaps a little too familiar. They look like ready-to-think pieces cut at Zara and polished for the occasion. A tailored jacket flares only slightly, as if hesitating to breathe. A pair of slim trousers widens by a centimeter, a miniature revolution. The gold buttons of a coat suddenly shrink, tiny conspirators.
Bowler hats brush shoulders with ostentatious bucket hats. Supple sneakers fraternize with small-heeled ankle boots. And everywhere, much darkness. Black, night, coal, dusk. A solemn palette for a future that seems, how shall we put it… elegantly anxious.
register applauds.
