A New Kind of Camouflage in Paris

When Raf Simons set out to explain what he hoped to achieve with his Fall 2015 collection for Christian Dior, he said “I wanted that feeling of a sensory overload,” anticipating, “a new kind of camouflage.”

This was highlighted by a selection of body suits and skin-tight, long sleeve, mid-length dresses set in pale colors reflected by brighter versions of the same color. The models wore thick black streaks of shadow over their eyes, which looked a little like leopard spots, and there were skirts punctuated by plackets that revealed their thighs when they walked. They looked like a little like the kind of “elevating” ready-to-wear Pebbles of Flinstones fame could have worn, which I think is precisely where Raf Simons excels in his ability to take a concept so resolutely un-high fashion and turn it on its head.

And anyway, Pebbles makes sense, right? This collection was supposed to portray the primal, animalistic instinct of a woman, presumably covered by the layers that society builds over this instinct, boasting a newfangled sense of political correctness and elegance set in ankle-length wool double-breast menswear style coats. The latex boots of couture made their foray into ready-to-wear and there was a series of new-age suits, set elaborately, laboriously, downright beautifully in patent leather but made to look a bit like the kind of net you might find holding together a bunch of lemons at Whole Foods.

These reminded that one of the most salient themes among the high fashion, high style, high technique runways of the last two seasons is this idea in the rapid world of turning-over fashion that is even faster than its assigned title suggests, it might be true that a $50 knock off can steal an idea, but it can’t quite swipe the bones that got it there.

And the bones, by the way, that got John Galliano at the front of Maison Margiela (Martin no longer withstanding), began to make a lot more sense last night. The designer, who was pushed out of the house of Dior in 2011 showed his first ready-to-wear collection yesterday and if he came in like a lamb (camel, ankle-length coat, acid-green neck scarf and orange de facto dish-washing gloves), he went out like a fantastically crazy, hunched over bag lady, an expert at liberal makeup application and entirely disinterested in coloring — or playing — between the lines.

The show certainly gave Paris something to talk about. Is this what we had in mind for Galliano’s comeback? Is this was Margiela had in mind for its own future?

Something certainly worked: without paying attention to the ambiance or the spectacle of the show, there were a handful of pieces that were wearable. Disciples of Margiela have exercised the spectacle vs. sellable balance in the collections that post-date him but no one has quite mastered it like the teacher. But in spite of the jewel-encrusted or feathered swim caps and leopard hair, and creepy, side-eyeing models-as-performers, it’s hard to argue against the use for a sleeveless black, ankle length dress or pinstriped skirt or embroidered duster. I won’t get on board with the closing series of capri pants and to be frank, I have never much cared for the clothing of John Galliano but in the new age of wearable, sellable high fashion divorced from the frills that once defined the elitist world, this collection may have proven that if you thought the designer emerged from a bygone era with no place in the present, you were wrong. But then again, only sales will tell.

And if that is the metric with which we are appraising the success of a collection, Alexander Wang’s Balenciaga was a home-run. But that’s just it, right? This is, no doubt, Alexander Wang’s Balenciaga. Sometimes I wonder if the designer is able to have as much fun, or get as weird, with his own label (corporate-core followed by gothcore, in case you’ve forgotten) because of his involvement with the house of Balenciaga, which demands a kind of polish. Ironically, though, it was New York that first came to mind when his opening dresses — sweetheart and feminine and down to the knee — first traipsed down his runway, evincing the same spirit of that grown-up, no bullshit woman we’re trying so hard to implant over there. Of course, this happens with incredible ease in Paris.

The cocoon-shoulders on his large jackets have become a mainstay of the new Balenciaga and the use of spray paint over his high-level textures actually reminded me of old Margiela. The closing gun-mental embellishments, though, which looked heavy and forceful — demanding a level of strength from its wearer — and the juxtaposition of some of the fabrics: wool tweed or brocade married to bonded leather straps that alluded to a sort of sexual repression emerging from underground, those were nothing sort of Wang. Talk about a new kind of camouflage.

Images via Style.com and The Cut

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