Irenebrination: Notes on Architecture, Art, Fashion, Fashion Law, Science & Technology

How Long Till Fashion Gets the Bitcoin Bug and Follows in the Footsteps of Art?

Last November Icelandic singer Björk allowed people to pre-order her new album "Utopia" from her label One Little Indian in four cryptocurrencies - Bitcoin, litecoin, dash, and AudioCoin.

While the value of Bitcoin dramatically plunged in the last few weeks (it is valued $9,987.23 at the time of writing this post), the concept of cryptocurrencies remains an intriguing one, a sort of ubiquitous talking point in different circles.

Yet some industries seem still clueless about them: as seen in a previous post, there are very few fashion sites where you can use cryptocurrencies and major fashion houses don't even bother mentioning transactions in Bitcoin and such likes. Things may be changing sooner than expected, though, especially now that the art market has opened up to cryptocurrencies.

Ronchini Gallery recently announced the project "Breaking the Fourth Wall" by Dutch artist Berndnaut Smilde at Platform at The Armory Show 2018, in New York (8th - 11th March). Curated by Jen Mergel, Platform features large-scale artworks, installations and site-specific commissions across the fair.

Smilde is known for his "Nimbus" series, recognised by TIME Magazine as one of the "Top Ten Inventions of 2012". The series features ephemeral clouds mysteriously hovering in indoor spaces.

"Breaking the Fourth Wall" takes its name from a theatre-expression used to describe directly addressing the audience and breaking the illusion of a play in productions. In this case it refers to the fact that Smilde's clouds will appear automatically and at random times throughout the duration of the fair, dissipating as mysteriously as they were formed.

To celebrate this event, Ronchini Gallery is selling a c-type print on aluminium of the photograph "Nimbus Powerstation" (2017) and it is only accepting payment through Bitcoin.

In a press release the gallery founder Lorenzo Ronchini stated: "The past few years has seen a growing acceptance of Bitcoin currency by industries and businesses. We understand its volatility, but also its potential power to transform our financial systems. The blockchain technology that underpins cryptocurrency offers the art market greater transparency and opportunity by addressing issues of copyright and ownership in the industry."

"This is the first-time we are taking payment on works in cryptocurrency and have plans to further explore the possibilities of these technologies and how they may enhance and influence the art world in the future. The gallery has represented Berndnaut Smilde for over 5 years, and in this time we've seen his works speak to audiences globally across science and technology as a symbol of innovation."

As much as Ronchini's decision may sound crazy, it is hilariously intriguing since it opens up new possibilities for the art market. In a way it could be considered as an experimental art project in itself.

Mainly populated by very wealthy clients, the art market may be radically transformed not just by quicker transactions, but also by the fact that people into such currencies aren't your average billionaires (imagine if ordinary people without yachts to park outside the Venice Biennale could invest their money into art...)

Who knows, maybe if cryptocurrencies become more accepted and ordinary people really start buying artworks, things will dramatically change. For the time being, Ronchini picked the perfect piece for this experiment: priced at one Bitcoin, Smilde's work seems to hint at the volatile value of the cryptocurrency. Just like the Dutch artist creates temporary indoor clouds that last long enough for a photo, cryptocurrencies are generated in an intangible and immaterial digital space and their value may plunge in an instant. 

Fashion houses interested in improving their performances and increase sales should maybe take attention to Ronchini's experiment. Who knows, some of them may be quicker in jumping on the bandwagon than others and even generate their own trendy currency. Maybe the Prada coin is nearer than we ever thought.

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Crafted, Innovative & Sustainable: The Future of Design According to The Henry van de Velde Awards 17 Winners

For a creative mind the act of designing something can be interpreted not just as a mere aesthetic exercise, but also as the result of a process triggered by the possibility of finding new solutions to specific problems or by the urge to improve some aspects of our lives.

Since their launch in 1994, the Henry van de Velde Awards have been celebrating such creative minds. This Belgian event honours indeed good design, showcasing national and international Flemish designers, enterprises, products, projects and services that have a positive impact on the economy and society.

The awards are divided in categories - Communication, Design-led Crafts, Ecodesign by OVAM, Efficiency, Everyday Life and Healthcare - with three extra awards, Lifetime Achievement, Young Talent and Company. Besides, the public's favourite product receives the Henry van de Velde Award via an online vote.

Flanders DC awarded the prizes in BOZAR, Brussels, today and we were pleased to hear that The Post-Couture Collective won the Ecodesign Award by Ovam.

This project started by Martijn van Strien in 2015 tackles issues of fashion excess and overconsumption and won this award for suggesting new methods for producing sustainable, affordable and personalised clothing (remember the post we did about them last year? Check it out for further info about this design collective).

Yet there are further intriguing projects in the other categories as well, some of them textile-based: the Design-led Crafts award went indeed to Tableskin, tactile tablecloth and napkins designed by Lore Langendries and made by Verilin, a family business from Kortrijk, in the South West Flanders.

Though it looks like a perfectly normal tablecloth, this piece has some conceptual connections: the textile represents indeed a digital image of a reindeer hide, rendered in a natural fabric.

The idea is to play with the attraction/repulsion dichotomy behind hair (think about luscious hair Vs hair/hairs found on the table...). The design also juxtaposes primitive times when animal hides were used by hunters, to the world of luxury and wealth that often fetishises furs. 

This prize this year is linked with the Company Award that went to Verilin for its luxury collections of table, bed and home linen. 

This 60-year-old company is specialised in made-to-order products, and receives regular orders from Michelin-starred chefs, artists and designers. The company has its own in-house production, weaving, cutting, embroidering and manually finishing the fabrics in its own workshops (the only external step is pre-processing, that is softening and pre-washing). 

One of the reasons why this company was awarded the prize is its strong urge for innovation: thanks to its investments in ground breaking, innovative research such as new looms, Verilin opened up intriguing weaving possibilities, like their Jacquard machines that can weave photographic images using 12,000 threads at once, producing extremely detailed results via complex patterns. 

Architects looking for intersting materials for their projects may find them in the "Dubio" bricks, designed by Roel Vandebeek for Nelissen Steenfabrieken. Based on the N70 brick, Dubio is characterised by shadow lines that create an illusion of two or three thin stacked bricks, an aesthetic and cost-cutting idea that benefits both bricklayers and architects (the weight of the total number of bricks required is 30% less than that of standard bricks, resulting in a 30% reduction in transport costs) and that won the brick the Efficiency Award.  

The compact design of his practical "Stubs" - four colourful and stackable stools for Labt that together form a whole - won Frank Ternier the Everyday Life Award. Apart from being functional, minimalist yet futuristic (when stacked they look a bit like wooden versions of R2-D2...), the stools come in lovely combinations of colours.

One important aspect of the awards is the fact that they are deeply linked with healthcare and wellbeing: design and engineering agency Voxdale won indeed the Healthcare Award with the Colli-Pee created for medical device company Novosanis.

The Colli-Pee allows for a highly concentrated first catch of urine sample which contains richer amounts of DNA, RNA and proteins which improves the accuracy of diagnostic tests.

The Theomatik, a tray devised by Theo Willen, who is volunteering in the St.-Ursula rehabilitation center, with the occupational therapists of the Jessa Hospital rehabilitation center and created by Boonen Design Studio, got the Public Award. The Theomatik is a system that helps people who aren’t able to use both arms to easily open items like butter dishes, jam jars or sugar.

The Communication Award went to a project that perfectly combined the past with the future: the Plantin-Moretus Museum, the first museum ever on the UNESCO World Heritage list, preserves the two oldest printing presses in the world. For its reopening in 2016, the museum turned to Kastaar, an analog printing factory in Antwerp, founded by graphic designers An Eisendrath and Stoffel Van den Bergh.

Kastaar conceived an original plan for promoting the reopening of the Plantin-Moretus Museum: it ventured out onto the streets of Antwerp with two mobile printing presses to bring the museum directly to people and designed its own museum shop collection based on 16th-century woodblock illustrations from the archive featuring animal, botanical and religious prints. 

The Young Talent Award went to industrial designer Sep Verboom for his sustainable alternatives to traditional industrial production that unite people and get them working together.

Verboom travelled in different countries, from the Philippines and Indonesia to Brazil, to work with talented and skilled artisans and designed fan lamps made from recycled ventilator hoods and woven rattan, and came up with pieces made with marine ropes or with fibres from the Carnauba tree.

Last but not least, Bart Lens won The Lifetime Achievement Award: a designer of buildings and objects, Lens applied his skills to a diversity of projects - houses, shops, hotels, industrial buildings, restorations and a series of objects including lighting fixtures and furniture.   

He is well-known for being the curator of Bokrijk, a large project involving the restoration of this open-air museum based in Limburg that weaves the past, present and future of craftsmanship into a single story.

The Henry van de Velde Awards have changed over the years along with the evolutions in the design field, and hopefully they will contribute to bring more positive transformations on a larger scale. It would indeed be brilliant to see certain ideas developed by this year's winners adopted by the fashion industry or by the healthcare system on a global scale.  

You can learn more about the Henry van de Velde Awards winners and nominees in the free exhibition in the foyer at BOZAR, Brussels (from 31 January until 15 April 2018).

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Religious Reverence for the Fashion Artisans: Valentino Haute Couture S/S 18

Haute Couture weeks are often accompanied by the same debates and the usual features wondering if high fashion can still be considered relevant in our times.

In his previous Haute Couture collection for Valentino, Pierpaolo Piccioli tried to give his own intrepretation of high fashion by bringing it down to earth by looking at the heavens via Francisco de Zurbarán's religious paintings.

Piccioli continued his studies in combining modern daywear and grand high fashion in Valentino's S/S 18 collection, showcased last week in Paris at the Hôtel Salomon de Rothschild.

The catwalk opened with a dichotomic look: a grand yellow faille coat with an oversized ruffle was matched with what looked like plain double-wool brown trousers and a basic white tank. The look was accessorised with a cumbersome pale blue ostrich feather hat, courtesy of Philip Treacy.

The jellyfish-shaped (or were they mushrooms?) hats returned throughout the collection, in aquamarine, mint, pink, burgundy and wysteria and in some cases the plumes turned into leaves and flowers blooming from the models' heads.

Maria Grazia Chiuri, Piccioli's previous creative partner at Valentino, was inspired in her collection for Dior by the Surrealist artist Leonor Fini and, somehow uncannily, these first Valentino looks called to mind Fini's headdress in her "Self-Portrait in a Red Hat" or the colours of another painting by Fini, "Gardienne des Sources".

Yet Piccioli wasn't looking at Fini for this collection: this Haute Couture for modern times was indeed made of the everyday language of fashion, but its trenchcoats and tops that evoked the practical appeal of a sweatshirt, were combined with the semantics of couture – that is feathers, opera-length gloves, ruffles, and voluminous taffeta capes.

Then followed long and short dresses, evening gowns with billowing capes in floral prints, tent dresses that engulfed models, tulle gowns that wrapped them in ethereal layers and cocktail dresses echoing the '80s.

Clashes of colours prevailed throughout the collection: a fuchsia top was matched with red trousers, pale blue gloves and a beige coat; in other cases a sash in a bright colour broke the linearity of a design, adding a quirky note to ordinary neutrals.

Tailored looks included double-layer coats in cashmere, functional pants and trenchcoats, but actresses looking for black gowns to promote on the red carpet the #MeToo and Time's Up campaigns will find some monastic yet elegant capes or the "Irene" dress, made with layers of gauze and silk crepe drops edged with a silk hem that transformed from small to large elements as they extended from bustier to skirt.

Inspirations moved from Haute Couture pictures and in particular from a photograph that had mesmerised Piccioli when he was a young man.

The image in questions was taken by Deborah Turbeville for Valentino in 1977 and showed a model clad in a voluminous red gown surrounded by more models dressed in black (View this photo).

That picture was one of the many on the designer's mood board for the house's S/S 18 collection, and symbolised the first fascination he felt for the house he now represents.

Piccioli then went beyond the picture and symbolically crossed the threshold of the house of Valentino where craftspeople work to make the dream of Haute Couture real and that was the moment when his passion for high fashion became more real.

The designer decided indeed to show the respect he has for the people working in the Rome atelier by naming the looks after their makers.

So, you had ordinary names such as Laura, Silvia and Irene for extravagant gowns with rather complicated stories and techniques behind them, matched here and there with jewellery representing hands and scissors, the tools of the artisans at Valentino.

Piccioli seemed to have genuine gratitude for the makers and their stories and even asked them to write a note about what couture means for them. The hand-written letters were then displayed inside white envelopes, while a "V" logo was recreated with their signatures.

Yet there was another inspiration here, maybe linked with the artisanal one: there were still echoes of Piccioli's A/W 17 collection for Valentino inspired by Francisco de Zurbarán in some looks, but Piccioli also moved from the paintings of Jacopo Carrucci, known as Pontormo (1494-1557).

The billowing pink cape in the background of Pontormo's "Visitation" was turned into an ample dress in soft pink; the heavenly blue shades in the "Deposition" inspired an imposing cape, and the attire of the Virgin Mary in "The Holy Family with the Young St. John" seemed echoed in a gown in the house's trademark red (the Met Museum should maybe pay attention to the religious undertones of the collection for its coming "Heavenly Bodies: Fashion and the Catholic Imagination" exhibition). 

There was maybe a further hidden connection between art and cinema here as Pier Paolo Pasolini recreated tableaux vivants of Pontormo's paintings in "La Ricotta" and Piccioli is also a Pasolini fan (remember the Valentino collection linked with Pasolini's Medea?).

In this collection religion was more to be interpreted as reverence for the work of the craftspeople working in a fashion atelier. The final message behind these gowns was indeed that only when fashion looks at the human beings behind it, at the men and women who make it, it has the power of becoming a religious experience.

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Bitter Sweet Symphony: Christian Dior Haute Couture S/S 18

It is utterly bizarre how you sometimes mention certain fashion references in a post and find yourself having to repeat them in the next one, when you spot specific links and connections in another design or collection.

In yesterday's post about Jean-Paul Gaultier's Haute Couture collection for example we mentioned Peggy Moffitt in Rudi Gernreich's designs, Germana Marucelli, Pierre Cardin, Roberto Capucci and Marc Jacobs, in connection with Op Art.

There were references to Op Art also in Christian Dior's collection (showcased last Monday, two days before Gaultier's show), even though they were reinterpreted via a different artistic movement.

The tent in the back garden of Musée Rodin where Dior's Haute Couture show took place was covered in black and white squares and the theme was replicated inside the tent, where the runway was transformed in an Alice Through the Looking Glass checkerboard floor.

Yet the sculptures of a torso, disembodied ears, eyes and random cages hanging from the ceiling revealed that this was no ordinary wonderland, but it was a surrealist playground in which black and white symbolised the colours of the subconscious.

In her first ready-to-wear season at Dior Maria Grazia Chiuri launched a slogan T-shirt stating "We Should All Be Feminists" that was followed by the provocative "Why have there been no great women artists?" shirt for the S/S 18 season.

Chiuri continued her feminist studies in her Haute Couture collection by looking at Argentinean painter, designer, illustrator and writer Leonor Fini, well-known for her paintings portraying impertinent and empowered young women.

A client of Dior, Fini was among the avant-garde artists the fashion designer exhibited in the early '30s, while he worked at the Galérie Bonjean.

Dior introduced Fini to Elsa Schiaparelli and the Surrealist artist ended up designing the bottle and packaging for her famous "Shocking" fragrance.

Chiuri included in the show notes a quote by Fini, stating "Only the inevitable theatricality of my life interests me", to explain to her audience the essence of the collection, suspended between the theatricality of high fashion and the balanced and rigorous and monastic (yet more wearable) moods Chiuri and her creative partner Pierpaolo Piccioli conjured up while working together at Valentino.

Chiuri's collection for Dior opened wih domino coats followed by surrealist chess board gowns, with black and white cubes twisting or gradually changing dimensions in a game of optical illusions.

Chiuri then introduced another theme with her woven basket dresses: employing velvet, organza and mink she built structures that reproduced one of the tropes of many Surrealist artists - the cage.

The sensually provocative yet ethereally delicate cage dresses fetishistically trapped and restrained the models' bodies, but also revealed them, while haute couture tattoos around their collarbones reproduced in black letters quotes by André Breton, author of the Surrealist Manifesto.

The quotes, turned into modern slogans, stated: "Au départ il ne s’agit pas de comprendre mais bien d’aimer" ("In the beginning it is not a matter of understanding, but of loving"), "L'amour est toujours deviant vous. Aimes!" ("Love is always before you. Love!") and "L'imaginaire est ce qui tend à devenir réel" ("The imaginary is what tends to become real").

At times, Chiuri interpreted Fini in a literal way, such as in the fringed cape that called to mind the artist's painting "Rogomelec".

At others she mixed Fini with other arty inspirations: the top of a dress reproducing in sequins the naked torso of a woman may have been a reference to Fini's "Portrait of Alida Valli" or a hint at Magritte's "Rape".

The dress may become a symbol for the #MeToo and Time's Up campaigns, but actresses intending to opt for black evening wear for the next red carpet ceremonies will find plenty of looks in the collection, going from tulle skirts matched with rigorous jackets to bar-jacketed trouser suits or the dramatic cloak with a tuxedo that closed the show. Grand, yet immensely sober and modest these designs have the potential of easily becoming the uniform of many modern stars.

Also the accessories were reinterpreted in a surrealist key: Stephen Jones' created graphic masks evoking balls (an exclusive Dior masked ball was organised the evening of the show) and as a reference to Peggy Guggenheim, who included Fini in the New York show "Exhibition by 31 Women" (1943).

The high-heeled shoes with feet outlines were instead a combination of René Magritte's "Le Modèle Rouge" with Pierre Cardin's 1986 men's footwear (and a remix of Comme Des Garcons' 2009 iconic design and Cèline's 2013 reinterpretation of the same shoes...).

Shoe straps shaped like gloves may have been references to American poet, novelist, diarist, filmmaker, photographer and collage artist Charles Henri Ford in a famous picture showing him in a costume covered with gloves designed by Salvador Dali (though gloves were another fascination of surrealist artists and designers in general...).

Yet behind all this perfection and the high fashion techniques employed in the designs, there was something that marred this collection.

First of all, the collection would have benefited from some editing (though surreal, the handkerchief dress in gold looked out of place View this photo and also seemed a Haute Couture version of something out of a Christopher Kane collection) and some designs were often reminiscent of the silhouettes Chiuri designed with Piccioli at Valentino.

Chiuri also picked bold graphics and patterns that, though filtered through the surrealist story she created around them, called to mind other fashion ghosts - from Gareth Pugh's S/S 2007 collection to Marc Jacobs' S/S 13 designs (yes, you may argue both Pugh and Jacobs were themselves borrowing from Op Art in these cases...), passing through Valentino's A/W 15 collection inspired by Emilie Louise Flöge and featuring quite a few black and white patterned motifs (View this photo).

There was also another story that cast a shadow on this collection: after seeing a dress from Dior Cruise 2018 collection on the cover of Elle magazine modelled by Bollywood actress Sonam Kapoor, New Delhi-based The People Tree accused the French fashion house of plagiarism. The prints on the Dior dress looked indeed extremely similar to the hand-printed ones created many years ago by the artisans working at People Tree, a collective of artists and designers co-founded in 1991 in the heart of Delhi by Orijit Sen and Gurpreet Sidhu and combining in their designs tradition with modernity.

Somehow it was a shame: Chiuri led us to believe that fashion can change through beauty, artisanal techniques and arty connections. But such faux pas shattered all her intents, proving that the industry has one and only mantra taken from The Verve's "Bitter Sweet Symphony" (a track that closed Dior's show - undoubtedly chosen for the refrain "I'm a million different people from one day to the next", almost a reference to Fini's passion for grand balls that allowed her to impersonate different characters...) stating "No change, I can't change, I can't change, I can't change..."

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With Pierre Cardin and M. C. Escher on the Op Art Bandwagon: Jean-Paul Gaultier Haute Couture S/S 18

In yesterday's post we looked at the dichotomy between the real and the virtual world in Margiela Artisanal S/S 18 designs. Yet that wasn't the only collection showcased during Paris Haute Couture Week that had an optical illusion theme.

Moving from his mentor, 95-year-old Pierre Cardin (who was sitting in the front row), Jean-Paul Gaultier reworked the theme through his own archive, mixing Op Art (a tricky reference as it has been done and redone ad nauseaum from the '60s on by Germana Marucelli, Roberto Capucci, Pucci, Moschino, Victoria Beckham, Marc Jacobs at Louis Vuitton, Thom Browne, Marc Jacobs and, more recently, Mary Katrantzou, just to mention a few designers and fashion labels) M.C. Escher and tailored moods.

The latter prevailed in some of the first designs on the runway and in the central section of the show. Trademark Gaultier silhouettes from the '80s were reinvented with inserts of fabric stripes twisted to create sensual openings with a futuristic (or architectural?) decorative intent; double-breasted square shouldered jackets sprouted long fringes, while a classic trench coat was cut on the bias and matched with tulle thigh-high boots and jackets were wrapped around the body to provide an alternative silhouette.

Colours – bold fuchsia, bright yellow and grass green – appeared only in this section of the show, while the first and the last part were characterised by two colours - black and white.

The opening look, a graphic striped tunic matched with black and white stockings was donned by a model with a hairstyle reminiscent of Peggy Moffitt in the iconic '60s images in which she posed in Rudi Gernreich's designs.

Yet Gaultier's main idea was homaging Cardin (as a young man, Gaultier worked for him as a studio assistant) and to strengthen this connection he also gave '60s evoking names to his designs, including ("Twiggy Pop", "Yellow Submarine" and) "Cardinella".

Some of the final designs focused more on surreal geometries and were inspired by M.C. Escher's Sphere Spirals.

This drawing, created in 1958 (so exactly 60 years ago), represents a complex infinite object, a sphere made of four spirals twisting around the spherical surface. The spirals are small at the poles and broad at the equator and their dimensions allow us to peer inside the sphere.

Gaultier first broke the sphere and engulfed a couple of models in a dress and a skirt made with spirals swirling around their bodies.

Then he printed Escher's sphere and tried to recreate its three-dimensionality using black plastic strips. The jewellery matching these designs also evoked Escher with plenty of spirals used as pendants and bangles.

Throughout his career Cardin was intrigued by the circle, a shape symbolising the moon and therefore representing his fascination with outer space. Gaultier used plenty of circles and spheres not only in the collection, but also in the runway set.

At the same time, rather than quoting literally Cardin (clearly evoked in a white mini dress with a matching cape and classic '60s jewellery...), he went his own way, reinventing some of his pieces (remember his Op Art cyber print from 1995?) and calling to mind artists à la Bridget Riley.

Too often, though, Gaultier ended up going down memory lane and conjuring up his own glorious past and his personal passion for theatrical designs. The show closed with Coco Rocha and her two-year-old daughter Ioni Conran in a matching dress. They were a hint maybe at the fact that the show was more about Gaultier's playful optimism than about Cardin, and that behind the complex geometries of Escher there was a healthy dose of space fun à la The Jetsons to be interpreted as an antidote to the pessimism reigning supreme in the world.

Everything Is Illuminated: Maison Margiela Haute Couture S/S 18

Real and Physical. Virtual and Digital. Which world do you prefer? In the fashion industry the question is legitimate, after all not all we see (think about photoshopped magazine covers...) is part of the real world as we know it. 

In the universe of fashion, there is another planet where what we see in reality is often altered and distorted by the digital medium - the runway. Quite a few members of the audience at runway shows nowdays end up watching the runway through the screens of their mobile phones.

This means that too often colour palettes get confused, tiny details get lost, while attention wanes as, right during a show, we rush to post on Instagram that perfect static moment or that model in movement for the benefit of our unknown followers scattered all over the world and our personal vanity.

Mesmerised by the dichotomy between what we see and what we get during a runway show, John Galliano attempted to create clothes for Maison Margiela Artisanal S/S 18 collection that sparked a dialogue between reality and the Instagrammable world.

The collection, showcased on Wednesday morning during Paris Haute Couture Week at the Maison's headquarters on Paris' rue Saint-Maur, opened with a series of dresses and garments that seemed to be made with a plain black fabric, but produced dazzling holographic effects that could be seen only on-screen when they were exposed to the lights of a mobile phone flash.

It was as if the flash released the ghosts trapped in the designs that were often layered stratifications of various deconstructed garments in different colours, fabrics and patterns, including some Comme Des Garçons' evoking polka dot prints.

The secret behind these designs was a reflective material and the effect was certainly enchanting, but definitely not new.

Galliano may have been the first designer to use the material for high fashion designs, but Kunihiko Morinaga at Anrealage has been experimenting with lights and shadows and reflective materials in ready-to-wear for quite a few years and has actually managed to produce wearable collections and even workwear made with fabrics that give his designs a transformative power.

The process to make the garments was probably more interesting than the actual clothes in Margiela's collection: the team took several pictures while making the pieces and altered them according to the effects they saw on the images taken.

The rest of the collection was a wise remix of Margiela and Galliano's tropes: piles of coloured feathers and a slipdress dress were sandwiched between see-through polyurethane layers; long elegant chinoiserie dresses were hidden under plastic to create a dichotomy between the artisanal power of materials such as silk and the brutal rigidity of industrial plastic; an anorak blended into a pleated bronze evening skirt and a deconstructed windbreaker was matched with a caged skirt.  

Clear plastic was also employed for the corsets matched with elegant dresses or with a sporty frothy design in a super bright shade of acid yellow. 

Yellow appeared quite a lot in the collection and it was often employed for plastic outerwear or as an extra techno layer between a coat and a slipdress. 

These designs may have actually been references to (one of the inspirations behind the collection?) Joi's plastic yellow raincoat in Denis Villeneuve's "Blade Runner 2049".

The iridescent PVC Chinese parasols accessorising designs such as an oversized padded jacket and an evening dress (both covered in see-through plastic) were probably references to the rain scenes in Ridley Scott's "Blade Runner".

The classic Margiela Artisanal touch was instead clear in a skirt made of Perspex color swatches and in the buttons decorating some of the dresses.

The trompe l'oeil trench was another classic Margiela trick, while the final gown with an iridescent pleated panel incorporated into the bodice (expect to see it on a red carpet or in a super cool music video...) evoked the ghost of Loïe Fuller.

As a whole the collection had a futuristic mood: the models on Margiela's runway may have been replicants or aliens just landed on planet Earth from a galaxy far away, they represented metaphors for speed, technology and innovation.

At the same time the collection was also reminiscent of other fashion labels that have been pushing the boundaries of fabric and material research (think Anrealage or Iris Van Herpen) while the styling called to mind Junya Watanabe's shows. 

That said, it was good seeing Galliano reshifting the attention on the power of fabrics and prompting people to wonder if in a few years' time we will be able to project images on clothes or to morph the patterns in a textile in a fraction of a second (themes that, as you may remember, we already explored in previous posts on this site...). We may not know what to expect from fabric researches, but these first visually mesmerising steps could be certainly considered as the perks of an uncertain but fascinating techno future.

Ludi Naturae: Iris Van Herpen Haute Couture S/S 18

In the 1600s fossils weren't seen as the remains of organic beings from earlier times, but were considered "ludi naturae", that is "jokes of nature" or "games of nature". They represented indeed forms in transition between the mineral, vegetable and animal realms.

It was very apt for fashion designer Iris Van Herpen to use this definition to describe her Haute Couture Spring/Summer 18 collection.

Van Herpen is known for designs that evoke different realms and combine various disciplines together, so, by describing the new creations as "ludi naturae", she preserved the aura of wonder surrounding fossils in the 1600s, while literally playing with the shapes, textures and patterns of nature. 

Showcased during Paris Haute Couture Week at the Galerie de Minérologie et de Géologie, the collection opened with a mini-dress covered in clusters of leaf-like elements.

The "Entropy" section of the show featured punctured nude leather designs: the tiny holes were maybe references to the stomata of a leaf, but the most interesting thing about these designs was the technique employed to replicate this microscopic structure of leaves.  

The iridescent beige and black fabrics in the garments were bonded to Mylar, individually laser cut into perforated diminishing patterns and then interwoven to form interlocking gradients from leather to voluminously billowing gowns. 

In the "Data Dust" designs impalpable silk tulle was employed as the base material for tattoo-like parametric patterns that were distorted, foam-lifted, laser-cut and then heat-bonded onto the fabric.

If you looked better you could spot among these laser-cut patterns further architectural and arty inspirations, derived from the intricate aerial photography of Thierry Bornier and Andy Yeung among others, and the weightless light paper sculptures of Peter Gentenaar (a site-specific installation by the Dutch artist was also suspended from the ceiling of the venue).

In some of the designs the technique assumed an almost retro-futuristic Art Deco style, especially in a long diaphanous gown that wouldn't have looked out of place on a femme fatale on the set of a 1920s film. 

The most innovative and complicated technique devised for this collection was introduced at the very end of the show with the "Foliage" section: with the help of Delft University of Technology, Van Herpen came up with extremely thin (around 0.8 mm) 3D printed leaf-like patterns and layers. The base material - nude tulle - was inserted into the 3D printer to print directly onto the fabric. 

The impalpable tulle sprouting 3D printed leaves transformed the models into mysterious plant-like creatures walking on perilously high platform shoes. The effect was completed by the final gown, a cloud-like explosion of undulating silk organza and Mylar. 

The palette of the collection with its iridescent sparkles, soft greens and deep inky tones evoked at times the colours in Guillermo del Toro's "The Shape of Water", recently nominated to 13 Oscars (Van Herpen already explored the power of air and water in her "Aeriform" collection).

There was actually something else that evoked the film: two necklaces with leaves sprouting from the tulle base seemed to grow out of the models wearing them, as if they were gills and you seriously wondered if this was a hint at the final scene of the movie (or maybe a suggestion for "The Shape of Water" actresses looking for original red carpet gowns for the Academy Awards...).

Fashion-wise Van Herpen is certainly doing a great research in the potential of extremely modern technologies to manufacture innovative fabric and textile effects. Her experiments remain technically fascinating, especially when you examine them close-up. Working a bit more on her silhouettes wouldn't hurt, though: some of the shapes in this collection looked indeed as if they were improved and updated versions of previous ones. 

Yet the hidden themes of "Ludi Naturae" - think about plant biology or the "root-brain" hypothesis, the effortlessly mathematical and geometrical structures existing in nature, the dichotomy between the artificial and the organic, the digital and the natural, and, in Van Herpen's words, "the patterns of chaos and order, nature and civilization blending into infinite hybrids" - you get the confirmation the Dutch designer remains a rare gem in the fashion industry thanks to her otherworldly creations and her modus operandi blending fashion, architecture, science and technology together. 

 

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Marbling Fabrics: Dries Van Noten Men's A/W 18

Belgian designer Dries Van Noten had a bit of an annus mirabilis in 2017: he held his 100th show last March; a few months later a book focusing on each of his collections came out and there was also a documentary, Reiner Holzemer's "Dries", one of those rare fashion films that sometimes manages to reveal the most intimate aspects in the life of a designer.

It can be difficult to follow up such a year, so Van Noten decided to opt for "a fresh start" for his A/W 18 menswear show, that took place during Paris Fashion Week at the former sorting center for the French Post Office and Customs and Excise.

Announced in a video message released to replace backstage interviews, the fresh start was actually Van Noten's trademark rich and balanced mix of moods and fabrics.

Tartans and checks were used for jackets and trousers, the latter were matched in some cases with half-kilts (a punk trend of the season as seen on other runways...).

Jackets covered in trademark intricate floral embroideries and embellishments crafted in India in Van Noten's own ateliers obviously made an appearance, but they were combined with other influences such as the American West, a theme introduced by cowboy shirts covered in surreal fringes that seemed to have overgrown the garments on which they were applied.

Romance was tackled via broderie anglaise trousers, coats and shirts in white or navy, the eyelets creating shadow and light motifs with the skin of the models.

Dichotomies also contributed to create intriguing juxtapositions: loose granny crocheted jumpers and hand-crafted knit collars were matched with military coats; a navy tracksuit was transformed with cowboy-shirt piping in a contrasting dark honey shade, while a psychedelic example of art - a detail from Robert Beatty's cover for "Rarity of Experience" by Chris Forsyth & The Solar Motel Band - was followed by more formal textures.

Psychedelia also appeared in the main part of the collection, a long series of light nylon smock coats, raincoats and bomber jackets with blown-up prints inspired by the marbled endpaper in old books.

Marbling is a decorative art technique consisting in producing patterns similar to marble or other stones by making colour float on plain water or on a viscous solution.

The floating colours are then manipulated either by blowing on them directly or through a straw, fanning the colours or stirring them, (in 19th century, Tokutaro Yagi, the Kyoto master of Japanese marbling, developed a method that uses a split piece of bamboo to stir the colours and create concentric designs) and then transferring them to paper or fabric.

This technique was already popular in Asia in the 15th century and was imported two centuries later by European travellers to the Middle East. 

They mainly applied it to book covers and end-papers, but also employed it to line chests, drawers and bookshelves and they adapted this art to marble the edges of books as well.

During the Renaissance many scientists were attracted by marbling, including Daniel Schwenter and Athanasius Kircher, and illustrations of marblers at work and images of the tools of the trade were included in the Encyclopédie of Denis Diderot and Jean le Rond d'Alembert.

The art became even more popular after the publication of The Art of Marbling in 1853 by English maker Charles Woolnough.

In a way, while the collection should have been edited, the eye-candy provided by the marbled prints was too pleasant to stop it from coming, and there were too many shades to pick from: vivid turquoise tones broke the military monotony of deep olive greens; bright lemon swirls mixed with teal, while purple erupted on a grey coat. 

The visual impact was strong and just when you thought you had found a favourite combination of colour, a better one that was even more enticing arrived on the runway. 

As a whole this was a recollaged collection of previous designs, but the fresh start was right in front of you, in that repetition and variation of colour marbling, symbolising that a new endless experimentation with tones, shades and patterns will be the way forward for Van Noten. 

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The Elephant in the Room & Other Stories: Vêtements A/W 18

In yesterday's post we lookd at two collections that took on the Parisian runways a wider debate about truth and freedom of expression. There were some hints at politics in a way on Vêtements' runway as well: "Russia don't you mess around with me" read indeed the slogan on a couple of the collaged tops included in the show.

The sentence was a biographical reference to the label's founder, Georgian designer Demna Gvasalia who left Abkhazia when he was a child and Russia supported a separatist revolt in the region, but it also hinted at the 2008 Russo-Georgian crisis. While the political reference was confined to these designs, the biographical hints continued throughout the collection via Gvasalia's main life inspiration - Martin Margiela.

Believing he had been so far misintepreted in his homages to Margiela that too often were maybe taken as lazy exercises in pilfering or prompted many to think that Vêtements was a tribute label, Gvasalia decided to face what he called "The Elephant in the Room", that is Margiela intended as influence and muse.

The men and women's show - that took place at the Paul Bert Serpette indoor market, located in the Saint-Ouen district, in the outskirts of Paris - opened with stylist Lotta Volkova wearing a fur coat inside out (new version of the one in Martin Margiela's 1984 Collection for The Golden Spindle contest?), revealing its nylon lining, matched with a headscarf and sunglasses and boots that seemed to have been made with passport covers (an idea also used for the clutches in the show).

The models that followed mainly sported coats inside out; at times the lining of a classic trench coat revealed one of those floral peasant dresses that made Vêtements famous. Most looks were completed by souvenir headscarves (you can easily find them in vintage stores at a fraction of the price...or maybe, like me, you're a fetishist of the souvenir scarf and already are the proud owner of one of those horridly embarrassing and utterly unwearable Venice scarves from 1981...) worn over baseball caps and at times matched with patent boots with prints of Zurich postcards.  

As th runway progressed the garments started being lined one on top of the other: tailored jackets were matched with streetwear; shirts were buried under sweats that were then hidden under ample coats. It looked as if the models had entered a thrift-store and had come out wearing as many clothes as they could.

Camouflage made a strong appearance in pants that seemed to have been fashioned out of camouflage nets bought on Amazon (what next, a Ghillie suit?). Shirts displayed prints of graffiti in different languages and of mock adverts à la Lidl, but with models wearing Vêtements' designs (a funny and ironic approach, finally).

Silhouettes in the meantime escalated reaching a Michelin Man-like level, but the Margiela-isms prevailed: turning oversized jackets around was very Margiela, but Gvasalia went to even greater lengths.

He actually asked kids from the kindergarten in Zurich near his studio to do some drawings around the "The elephant in the room" theme, to evoke Margiela's Spring/Summer 1990 collection and that show invitation drawn by kids (and maybe to avoid paying copyrights; are children's scribbles and drawings copyright-able?).

The "ode" to Margiela continued via four-stitched labels and new versions of his Tabi boots, alternated to trendy horrid trainers and sock boots (the former evoked the attire of '90s club-kids in a scarily uncanny way...).

While understandable, Gvasalia's obsession with Margiela is verging towards the unhealthy: he worked there between 2009 and 2012 and doesn't seem to have any other references apart from Margiela, as if he had had very limited fashion experiences before ending up under the fashion spotlight. 

The idea behind Gvasalia's Tabi boots is that Margiela appropriated them from the Japanese tradition, while he is appropriating them and reinventing the shoes from Margiela. In a nutshell, in his view he should not just be allowed to do it, but he is fully entitled to do it. 

Yet appropriation should have its limits: the brand's DHL T-shirt Gvasalia & Co did in 2016 may have been a hit, but it was on the market at immoral prices ($330, remember), revealing that the brand is maybe more about hysteria and immediate limited trends than about a strong identity.

In this collection there weren't just Margielaisms, but there were also some possible copyright infringements: Gvasalia covered for example his denim designs with cute stickers and patches, but among them there was also a logo reminiscent of the American Monster Energy NASCAR Cup Series Toyota Racing team BK Racing. You wonder if this was a legitimate collaboration or maybe one of those accidental pilfering acts similar to the time Gvasalia stole a Ruff Ryders shirt design from 2000 for a Balenciaga collection.

If you dissected Vêtements' collaged shirts you would have also discovered a chopped Planet Hollywood logo, a Spider-Man quilted coat, Marilyn Manson T-shirts (was this a legitimate collab?), and a random EU logo for organic food regulations.

Assuming that Gvasalia has paid for all these collaborations, the EU logo may pose new and intriguing problems: the logo is indeed mainly used to make organic products easier to be identified by the consumers. The organic symbol is protected from being used on non-organic products throughout the EU. Now, Gvasalia sweaters may or may not be organic cotton, but they are not food and, even though this top may be considered a parody design and therefore may escape copyright infringement, the EU may still come after him for generating confusion in the consumers.

Last but not least, the styling of the collection evoked here and there the collaged look adopted by people shopping in charity shops and wearing recycled garments not for trendy reasons but for necessity.

The problem is that the models on the runway were mimicking these characters living in liminal spaces such as the banlieues, but were doing so wearing luxury versions of their clothes (in the same way you may be wearing an expensive DHL T-shirt but you're not working for the courier and may be accidentally mocking those ones who are working hard for the company...).

So, in a way Margiela was just one of the many elephants in Gvasalia's room that currently seems to be packed with endless exercises in appropriating and quoting, practices considered as signs of avant-garde conceptualism (would you praise a student who would appropriate the Tabi boots for his/her graduation project?) and are sold at improbable prices.

It would be interesting to hear what Margiela thinks about this all: maybe he is laughing his heart out, thinking that he did the right thing when he left the fashion industry behind; maybe he is crying at the sorry state of it all.

Yet, while Margiela may have been a fashion pioneer, he was deeply wrong about one thing. In an interview for the catalogue of the 2015-2016 exhibition "Footprint - The Track of Shoes in Fashion" at MoMu Antwerp, he indeed stated: "The Tabi boot is the most important footprint of my career: it's recognisable, it still goes on after 25 years, and it has never been copied." Sorry, Mr Margiela, it is definitely recognisable and iconic, but it has now been copied. 

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On the Runways a Call for Truth and for Freedom of Expression: Sacai, Études & The New York Times

Before Donald Trump became president of the United States, the definition "fake news" was mainly applied to describe intentionally misleading information and hoaxes divulged via traditional means of communication or online, for example via social media.

Fake news became in the last few years a dangerous practice as they can easily start a trend, especially when bots help spreading them via fake social media accounts.

US President Donald Trump introduced a new meaning to this definition, hinting with the term "fake news" to those news outlets that do not agree with him. Trump's rants about "fake news" have actually turned into one of the first and foremost sources of misinformation.

At the weekend while various women's marches were taking place all over the United States - from New York and Washington, D.C. to Chicago, Los Angeles and Philadelphia, just to mention a few places - Trump even stated in a tweet: "Beautiful weather all over our great country, a perfect day for all Women to March. Get out there now to celebrate the historic milestones and unprecedented economic success and wealth creation that has taken place over the last 12 months. Lowest female unemployment in 18 years!" 

Now, either the stable genius (as he recently defined himself...) didn't realise what the women's march was about or he is creating a parallel reality he likes to inhabit where he spreads his own news and beliefs.

But is it possible to tackle a complex theme such as the "fake news" issue on the runway? Apparently yes, as proved by the trends recently seen during the Paris menswear shows.

Japanese designer Chitose Abe opened her A/W 18 menswear and Pre-Fall 2018 womenswear Sacai collections with the results of her collaboration with Reyn Spooner, a brand more famous for its Hawaiian shirts.

The collaboration seemed unlikely, but Abe and Reyn Spooner represent Japan and Hawaii, countries at the centre of the recent nuclear tensions between North Korea and the USA, so working together for them was maybe a way to react to aggressive threats and pessimism in a positive way.

The unlikely match also worked on the runway: rather than coming up with short sleeved Hawaiian shirts, Abe turned the prints into wintry motifs for padded jacket, sweaters and fringed ponchos matched with leggings and trousers in the same patterns.

The designs came in a palette of red, purple, green, blue and white that actually worked pretty well, giving a dynamic rhythm to the rest of the show.

Then Abe remixed a series of garments and repatched them together: traditional check patterns, Aran knits, plaid motifs, padded or fur panels and sensible tailored jackets were deconstructed and recombined.

Some of the designs were zipped together, others were seamlessly joined together as it happened to a skier's sweater with a traditional Nordic motif mashed with a camouflage parka for that military utility-meets-mountain holiday vibe. 

The exercise may have been disastrous as Abe collaged in one design several garments and patterns, yet the outcomes of this monstrous hybridisation (definitely a trend seen also at Prada, as you may remember) were quite pleasing, especially when it came to the dresses in which very different fabrics such as heavy velvet and light chiffon were stitched together or to a pleated half kilt in a tweed fabric matched with sporty denim pants.

Abe avoided falling into cliches, producing harmony via contrasts: the final mood was idyllic and a bit folkish, a vibe strengthened by the other collaborations on the runway with Uggs for footwear and with Japanese jewellery brand Goro (the late Goro Takahashi was close to the Lakota tribe and became the first non-Lakota person to take part in the "Sun Dance") for the silver feather pendants, while the bags were inspired by Sioux and Native American art.

But there was a modern twist added in the designs and some slogans that brought back the collection to our days: Abe included indeed in the collection a T-shirt and a hoodie with The New York Times' "Truth. It's more important now than ever" slogan, part of the newspaper "The Truth is Hard" 2017 ad campaign.

On the back of one hoodie Abe also printed the full New York Times manifesto, a 19-line long declaration that could be read as an active poem for truth.

The New York Times campaign wasn't actually a direct reaction to the attacks of President Donald Trump to media outlets he dislikes, but it was more a way for the newspaper to combat the proliferation of "fake news" and remind to consumers which are the core values of the publication.

There was actually a further connection with the media in Abe's show as Sacai's catwalk took place in the old buildings of the Liberation newspaper.

Sacai wasn't the only one celebrating the freedom of the press on the runway: young French brand Études also displayed an interest in such themes. 

Their collection moved from ancient Greece and photojournalists' vests: red and black figure vessels appeared on sweats and on knitted scarves and the classic multipocketed vest was turned into jackets, coats or functional skirts.  

Maybe there was a bit of the late photographer Kevin Carter and the Bang Bang Club in the practical clothes: while the climbing hooks pointed at freetime and activities in the open air, the survival ropes decorating the sweaters or the coats hinted at more hostile environments. 

But while Kevin Carter freelanced in war zones, the models on this runways inhabited a urban environment, as proved by The New York Times logo knitted on scarves or printed on shirts and sweats.

The designers Jérémie Égry, Aurélien Arbet and José Lamali, stated there was no political message behind such garments, but they included them in the show to support freedom of expression. A further cue was given by the prints of Robert Crumb's "Fritz the Cat" on a shirt: if you thought about Crumb's "Zap Comix" and its focus on open, uncensored self-expression, you realised the reference went pretty well with the journalistic theme the design collective tried to tackle.

So this was the best message out of the men's collections: even a frivolous runway show can become a good opportunity to remind us all about a search for the truth and a fundamental human right such as freedom of expression. Let's just hope these themes will not be just an excuse for trendy clothes, but they will keep on being quintessential parts of who we are. 

 

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