There are still quite a few fashion designers out there who are into enchanting their audiences with some kind of spectacle when presenting their new collections, hoping to take them to another and more fantastic world during their shows.
Yet fashion reflects the society that creates it and, if, as we have seen, the layered, overcomplicated and voluminous looks that appeared on some of the current runways, may be symptoms of chaos and decline, designers opting for clinical looks may be trying to tell us a different story about our society, maybe a tale of alienation and isolation.
During New York Fashion Week models wearing skirt suits and shifts characterised by clinically simple and futuristic clean silhouettes entered and exited the runway using escalators at Alberta Ferretti’s catwalk show for her Philosophy line.
The designer claimed her models, with their waists cinched by Perspex belts, wearing garments decorated with crystals trapped in layers of futuristic PVC or plastic-coated coats, represented androids and that the escalators were instead conveyor belts. Somehow there were moments at the very beginning of the show where you could have drawn comparisons with George Lucas’ film THX 1138.
This movie is set in a dystopic future ruled by a rigid and repressive society. Sex is outlawed, people’s minds are controlled through the use of drugs and there is no tangible difference between men and women, all wear indeed the same uniforms and all have shaved heads.
Moving to London Fashion Week the idea of alienation was reinforced and explored in connection with fashion. Richard Nicoll abandoned the traditional catwalk format in favour of an installation at the ICA Theatre on The Mall and, while there were no THX 1138, LUH 3417, and SEN 5241 attempting to escape from a white and suffocating futuristic set here and no dystopic fashion visions à la Rudi Gernreich, the designer tried to make a strong comment on the fashion industry.
Entitled “Modern Times” and featuring streamlined and decorous dresses, pleated shifts and fine cashmere sweaters matched with leather skirts or straight pants in white, grey, orange, navy and yellow, the collection criticised the pace fashion designers are expected to work at.
Models posed on a conveyor belt as if they were the product of a factory in which the fashion designer, the stylists and the photographers are anonymous workers condemned to repeat collection after collection the same actions. A futuristic touch was added via a bag sponsored by Vodafone that charges mobile phones.
So, while Nicoll explored the alienation the fashion industry is spreading at different levels (fashion designers may feel alienated, but what about consumers constantly bombarded by messages about the latest "must have" piece?), J.W. Anderson moved from a different, yet equally dystopic, interpretation.
His show was entitled “Chamber of Isolation” and revolved around the theme of physical oppression, translated in the clothes through white, black or pinstriped (a hint to men in pinstriped suits, traditionally seen as symbols of power?) quilted vests that were half straightjacket, half fencing suit and played with the constriction/protection dichotomy (mind you, that’s not a new idea: we have seen Nina Donis coming up with padded garments that cleverly mixed medical attire, fencing suits and elegance in an architectural key for the Autumn/Winter 2011-12 season).
The clinical theme was emphasised in the neoprene quilted vests and in the hospital-like patent uniforms, while the fishermen's hats added a somewhat bizarre note to the collection and the long checkered A-line skirts brought back J.W. Anderson’s repressed/oppressed woman in the madness-inducing realm of her house.
Maybe, behind all the superficiality of these fashion weeks, designers are truly trying to say something not only about the condition of modern women, but also about their own conditions.
Most of the times the alienation/isolation dichotomy appears in fashion it is actually treated like another theme for a commercial collection, but there are cases when this topic hides deep undercurrents.
Nicoll’s statement about the fashion designer as a factory worker is emblematic for example and maybe listening to these messages and hints behind some collections would save us from passing from a mild and moderate to a severe stage of fashion alienation, and ultimately lead us towards a slower yet healthier fashion system.
Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos
Member of the Boxxet Network of Blogs, Videos and Photos
Comments