Paris Haute Couture Fall/Winter 07/08
The autumn haute couture shows in Paris had a strangely subdued mood. It was partly the dreadful weather – the wind chilling revellers at Christian Diors sixtieth anniversary extravaganza in the grand gardens of the Versailles Orangery, and the continuous heavy rain on Karl Lagerfelds beautifully disciplined parade for Chanel, and partly, despite astonishingly beautiful clothes that demonstrated both the supreme artistry of couture workmanship and decoration and the designers¹ imagination, a lack of the adventurous edge that characterised couture in the past.
There is a specific reason for this. When couture had few new clients coming forward, the houses used it mainly for publicity and designer experimentation that produced headlines and extraordinary, if often unwearable, clothes. Now there has been a great shakeout, with the number of big names reduced to less than ten and even Valentino, retreating to his home base of Rome to show his forty-fifth anniversary collection, amid speculation that he will now retire. But new global wealth means couture has more clients than it has for many decades, so its new focus is on stunning but essentially wearable, saleable clothes, though the old thrill of the outrageous is missing as a result.
The new mood was nowhere more evident than at Dior. The last time designer John Galliano showed at Versailles was 1999, for the famous Matrix collection that shocked fashion into modernism. This show was far more conventional yet, celebrating both Dior's sixtieth anniversary and Galliano's decade as designer, it symbolised both the house¹s rich history and Galliano's profound inifouence. Each outfit inspired by an artist (acknowledging Christian Dior¹s own substantial collection), it started with the perfect black 1940s-style suit with a classic Dior Bar jacket and went on to celebrate the Impressionists, Pre-Raphaelties, the Romantics, the Flemish school and Old Masters, all in an unmistakably Galliano-esque way. Grand dresses with ornate gold or black beading and mantillas referencing Spanish masters like Velazquez ands Zurbaran acknowledged his own background;. In this elegant, and elegiac, collection, dedicated to chief assistant Steven Robinson who died recently, the furs were few but perfectly judged – a pink silk gown scattered with appliquéd organza flowers, its waterfall sleeves edged with matching fox, a lilac double-fox stole softening a grand lilac tulle hourglass dress with tip-tilted cartwheel hat, and a vast white fox and mink-tail ermine-look wrap over a regal ochre silk gown.
Erdem’s Fascination for French Women
London Fashion Week each year presents new and promising talent from all over the world. Some continues to catch the attention of the Media and one of them is the young, metropolitan designer, Erdem .
A whimsical, romantic style, complete with embroideries and floral prints is usually synonymous with Erdem . But in his latest show, London´s rising fashion star took a different path sending out a very French and womanly collection, inspired by the great photographers of the 1970s and 1980s; Guy Bourdin and Helmut Newton.
”I was trying to capture the spirit of the early 1980s with a really streamlined and elegant style, with lots of black, navy and fur
embroidered with lace and lamé. The end result was beautiful, with a certain toughness and the way it’s made, it’s difficult to see, where the fur begins and where it ends,” he explains.
The 29-year-old womenswear designer grew up in Montreal and Birmingham, before training at the Royal College of Art in London. After receiving his MA, he worked for Diane von Furstenberg in New York, and in 2005 he launched his own label, Erdem.
Three seasons after winning the prestigious £100,000 Fashion Fringe award, – who is English on his mother’s side, and Turkish on his father’s – has managed to stay on the cutting edge of London fashion.
”I was always sketching as a child and through school. Today, I still work in the same way as when I was five. The only difference now is that there are more people around me,” smiles who’s twin sister, Sara – maker of tv documentaries - is one of his hardest critics.
Fur was always a part of ’s design vision. While studying for his BA at the university of design in Montreal he worked with various types of fur and used it in his graduation collection.
”Fur is beautiful and versatile, and I have always embraced it as a textile. Today it’s an integral part of my designs, as if it always belonged there. This year was about controlled volume. Before I used to do trims. Next time I’d like to do a full length coat and explore volume and the cocooning aspect with fox skins,” says who is planning his third visit to the Saga Furs workshop in Vedbæk. ”In Canada I tried working with racoon. But I’d love to get my hands on a real Saga Finnracoon. There’s something very delicate about it.”
American luxury
Fur plays an important part in the DNA of the American fashion star, Michael Kors – a crucial fact, which each year brings his young fur designer, Ted Kim to visit Saga Furs.
“Fur is a part of who we are. Michael Kors is about American luxury, and the rich and powerful will always wear fur. Last season it was downplayed and we realized that that was a big mistake. All our fur pieces got a lot of credit in the press. So Michael, said, if we have even more fur, we’ll get even more credit,” smiles Ted Kim while chilling out at the pool at the Saga Furs Design Centre; a place he considers his Danish home.
It was the challenge of making younger and more accessible fur, which brought Kim to Michael Kors six years ago. Today, he tells, the fashion house has more emphasis on fur than when he started.
At 28 degrees celsius, however, the idea of fur is not one that instantly springs up in ones mind. But as a senior designer in charge of the furs, Kim thinks about it all year round.
“We finished our commercial fur line 2-3 weeks ago. We have runway furs and a totally separate fur line for salons and major department stores, which gets a really good response. Now I’m here to see what’s up. I’m going through the archives to see if there’s something that pushes my inspirational button.“
“This year was full of fur. It was almost like a fur show, where each piece had a fur trim or a fur accessory. It turned out to be one of the most successful collections. We had several fox trims and dyed fox which the magazines loved,” says Kim who feels that fur always brings an added exclusiveness to luxury fashion.
“You can combine it with sportswear to give it a casual appearance, and you can make a fur poncho. This season there’s a lot of lighter, tonal beige furs, light grey, off white, taupe. I’m not sure where we’re going for the next season. But we’ll probably downplay the volume. And I’ll still be working on making fur more accessible.” |
|
