The Waiting Game
Paris Fashion Week has added an extra day to its calendar, reflecting the strain on fashion houses as they try to complete production of their collection presentation videos amid ongoing restrictions linked to the coronavirus pandemic.
The fall 2021 women’s ready-towear collections, due to be shown from March 1 to 9, will now run over to March 10, the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode said Friday. Louis Vuitton, which was initially due to unveil its collection on March 9, has moved to the following day, without specifying the reason.
The calendar has proved to be something of a moving target. Dior, initially scheduled for March 4, has moved its show to March 8, and other brands are still modifying their plans.
Olivier Theyskens has postponed the presentation of his collection, originally on March 5, without setting a new date. Mugler likewise will no longer show on March 3, but sometime later that month.
With few, if any, livestreamed shows, fashion houses are taking the time to finalize their projects, even if it means forgoing their initial time slots on the preliminary schedule, released earlier this month. Several houses will be filming their displays in a runway format, but several hours, or even days, before the video is revealed on the federation’s digital platform.
Though major houses like Chanel, Dior, Vuitton, Givenchy, Hermès, Loewe and Miu Miu have stuck to the Paris schedule, a host of tentpole brands are absent again this season, including the Keringowned Saint Laurent, Balenciaga and Alexander McQueen, and Celine, part of luxury conglomerate LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton. — JOELLE DIDERICH