Languages

Runway Reviews

Valentino Haute Couture Fall/Winter 2023-24

15 Aug 2023

For the Valentino Haute Couture Fall/Winter 2023-24 Valentino show, a Château is, to Creative Director Pierpaolo Piccioli, a metaphysical entity, a context that can itself be recontextualized. Witness to a past time, a space bears traces of the lives lived within it – formerly emblematic of notions of elitism and status, a Château can today reject its history, to be recalibrated. Nameless and universal, a Château can exist as an everyplace for everyone, can become a forum for a new... Read More

Elie Saab Haute Couture: Symbols of abundance

01 Aug 2023

The Elie Saab Haute Couture Spring/Summer 23 moves in such currents of richness and symbols of abundance. Each majestic piece is intricate and ornate, carefully created with impressions from the natural scenes and rituals of the revered kingdom of Thailand, where rich cultures of gilded splendor inspire the imagination and artistry of Elie Saab. To inaugurate the captivating celebration, she begins her perpetual rise alongside her partner, and together, in splendid harmony, they emit... Read More

Chanel’s Spring-Summer 2023 Haute Couture collection

22 Mar 2023

For Chanel’s Spring-Summer 2023 Haute Couture collection, Virginie Viyard and Xavier Veilhan headed to Gabrielle Chanel’s apartment at 31, Rue Cambon and found inspiration in the collection of objects, sculptures, drawings representing lions, does, stags, birds and camels displayed at this emblematic address. Reinterpreting the apartment’s bestiary in an exquisite way fit for a Couture collection, this world of animals came to life through embroideries on short tweed suits and coat dresses,... Read More

Schiaparelli Haute Couture Spring-Summer 2023

13 Feb 2023

In 1308, the poet Dante Alighieri began what would be his masterwork, The Divine Comedy, a 14,233-line poem divided into three books: Inferno, Purgatorio, and Paradiso.

We all know this work, by name if not by heart. And yet when I revisited it recently, I was struck by something I’d missed when I first encountered it—not the horror of hell that Dante conjures so vividly, nor the sense of despair that overcomes you as you descend further and further into the realm—but by how the story... Read More

The tree of life in Dior's Haute Couture FW22

12 Dec 2022

The tree of life is the starting point for the Dior Haute Couture Fall-Winter 2022-2023 collection, imagined by Maria Grazia Chiuri, Artistic Director of the Maison. This Dior collection is composed of a series of pieces through which folkloric imaginations resonate.

A vision that freely invests several models thanks to the profusion of embroidery, made of cotton threads, silk and rope. The shades of beige are sometimes punctuated by a touch of black or blue. These embroideries are... Read More

Michael Kors Fall 2022: A lot of statement outerwear

06 Oct 2022

Kors leaned into what he does best, classic tailoring for dressing up during day, draped and asymmetrically cut jersey sequin gowns, dynamic knits, and lots and lots of statement outerwear.

“When I think about New York, it’s the stride, it’s always the stride,” said Michael Kors, previewing his fall collection about stepping out and turning heads.

Kors shifted his show to the evening hours this season, and enlisted Miguel to warm up the crowd. He got toes tapping, including... Read More

Valentino: Anatomy of Couture

27 May 2022

The body, that of women in particular, is both a matter of fact and a cultural construct, of which beauty canons change over time, imposing now tense verticality, now soft horizontality, celebrating certain parts of the anatomy over others. In the system of Haute Couture this drive to idealization materializes in the body of the house model, on which everything is designed and built, becoming real while remaining an abstraction.

Driven by the urgency of rethinking the rituals and... Read More

Dior Haute Couture Spring/Summer 2022

15 Apr 2022

By definition, haute couture is handmade, from start to finish. The labor-intensive process is hidden in the details, and to the untrained eye, all there is to see is exquisite runway plastered with detailed embroidery, fancy embellishments, and expertise in textile manipulation. But what we rarely think about is the time that goes into it. These made-to-measure designer items are akin to art, and many belong in a museum. For Dior’s spring-summer 2022 haute couture collection, sometimes it... Read More

Jean Paul Gaultier Couture Spring/Summer 2022 by Glenn Martens

24 Mar 2022

Glenn Martens unveils his vision of Gaultier haute couture – the second designer to do so, after Chitose Abe of Sacai last season – Martens was doing what he does so well: exuding grace and humor under pressure. And make no mistake, the pressure is indeed on. “Apparently, with couture, you finish it the minute before it goes on the runway,” Martens said, with a laugh. “So, we are a bit stressed, but not for the first time.”

One of the looks he was furiously working on, viewed courtesy... Read More

Viktor & Rolf explores the world’s obsession with royalty

17 Feb 2022

As reticent as Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren are, they indubitably know something that the rest of us don’t or they frame the expected in ways that make us reconsider it. That is certainly the case with their latest collection, which at first glance, might seem to tread familiar ground, with coat shapes resembling those from their Russian doll collection for fall 1999, and slogan sashes from spring 2019. The pair carried over their interest in jeweled embellishments here, though in... Read More