Fashion’s final blast…
After years of nostalgia designers are leaving retro influences behind, says Lisa Armstrong
It’s almost half a century since Stanley Kubrick’s vision of the future seared itself onto several generations’ collective retinas in 2001: A Space Odyssey. Released in 1968, the film became a cult classic. Chanel nudged in early on the commemorations yesterday with another of its mega shows. Battalions of starship troopers marched around a more or less life-sized space rocket. “I refuse to be impressed unless it actually takes off,” pronounced one blasé fashion editor (me). It did. And then there were those glittery knee-boots with patent contrasting toe-tips that accompanied every single look. Sometimes it only takes one accessory to deliver a brand those dreamed-for profits for the season. Could the boots do it? Could the metallic leather knuckle-warmers? Or the new oversized silver bags? (Oversized is now a bonafide trend in bags again, just as it is in silhouettes.) And what to make of those shiny quilted blankets that sat like little cones above the models’ shoulders – a deluxe upgrade on those metal sheets popular with festival goers? Quirky, for sure, but that’s often what the luxury fashion customer desires. And for the classicists, there were essence-of-Chanel tweed suits aplenty, albeit worn over strange little tweed shorts. What’s not to love about an impeccably cut, ivory wool pea-coat (OK, it was modelled by a small boy, but for most Chanel clients that means it will be a perfect fit) or a black mohair jacket piped in white? The more closely you looked (tricky as Chanel’s grands spectacles place even the front row some distance from the action), the more there was for Chanel aficionados to wear. Lurex or silver-trimmed macramé jumpers that take trophy knits to the next level, pearl-edged sparkly navy jackets, pristine white tailored trousers, silverised leather coats with sheepskin sleeves. Was it space age? Perhaps not, but it had plenty of Chanel’s spirit, while nodding to the bigger shoulders, which are becoming a scaffolding of the new silhouette. And as we now know, 2001, when it came round, didn’t look very space age-y. At Dior in September 2001, John Galliano was headlong into his love affair with the 18th century. At Louis Vuitton, Marc Jacobs was just beginning to add embellishment to his minimalism. Chanel that autumn kept everything light and pretty with pastels … In late 2001, 9/11 had happened. Like everything else, fashion didn’t know quite how it was meant to react. There was even talk, in the aftermath of September 11 – in the middle of New York Fashion Week – of cancelling the rest of the shows. Swaggering optimism there was not. For the next decade the catwalks were filled with endless nostalgic pastiches. It’s only in the past year or so that we’ve begun to see clothes that look distinctively of our time. Balenciaga is the obvious catalyst. Its overblown silhouettes may have their genesis in the label’s 1950s archives, but creative director Demna Gvasalia turns them into something unexpected, literally, askew (buttons done up wrongly) and bracingly unsettling to the eye. It’s extreme, but that fits with the rhetoric of our time.
Feminism, back on the political agenda, certainly made itself felt on the catwalks this month.
Louis Vuitton, a label that often polarises opinions on the red carpet, is never nostalgic. Creative Director Nicolas Ghesquiere is a modernist who likes women to look tough and unsentimental, even when he’s soured by American sportswear and folklore, as here.
In practice that meant clean, lean “workwear” staples with crafted embellishment. Standouts included razor-sharp canvas trouser “suits” in cerulean blue – a rather brilliant take on the heinous smart-casual genre – and patent lingerie wear. Grounding everything were deluxe biker boots.
Fashion’s shot at the future has to be a good thing. Whatever you think of the inflated, layered, covered up way of dressing, it’s taking root, it’s new and it speaks to our time.