THOM BROWNE: MOURNING BECOMES HIM

If you’re going to be in mourning, you might as well wear something to die for. That was the theory behind Thom Browne’s darkly beautiful fashion show, and we do mean dark — every item was black. And if you were close enough to see the intricate fabric work and tailoring on his 40 mourning outfits, you knew instantly that no funeral could possibly be this exquisite.

And that’s even before you got to the models’ heads, which bore the audaciously creative handiwork of star milliner Stephen Jones.

But before the mourning came the death. Browne placed his story in an old-fashioned, wood-panelled operating theatre, perhaps in the 18th century. The audience, which included singer Nicki Minaj, sat in what felt like church pews, looking down. On three gurneys lay three young women, all in white. Each was attended by two doctors, who examined them, not sadly but with a sense of caring, for some 30 minutes before the show actually started.

Then, a chord in the music signalled the doctors to begin their transformation. They removed their medical coats to reveal jackets with angel’s wings on the backs. As snow started to fall, the angels slowly escorted their corpses, now sitting up and facing heaven — these women had died of broken hearts, you see — out of the theatre.

And then came their fashionable friends, one by one, in their mourning attire: capes, coats, jackets and cardigans, skirts and dresses — in lace, cashmere, mohair, flannel, silk, satin and everything else you could think of, with intricately detailed embroidery and Browne’s impeccable tailoring, of course.

Browne is known for huge theatrical productions like this, and perhaps his best was his recent spring/summer collection, featuring a fairytale (by Browne) narrated by Diane Keaton. Monday evening’s show could have perhaps used just a bit of narration or explanation, but the craftsmanship on view needed none at all. To die for, indeed.