Jean Paul Gaultier: Haute Couture FW16/17

Jean Paul Gaultier took us into the woods with his couture collection. It was an unusual setup for JPG. He’s more likely to summon the ghosts of Paris’s legendary nightclub Le Palace, or re-create Dancing with the Stars with a supermodel cast and an all-star jury. Gaultier’s never struck anybody as the outdoorsy type, has he? He’s a people person. But in his trademark fashion, he did woodsy with gusto.

As such, a wood-grain print got things going, appearing on everything from a slinky catsuit to a straight-world belted coat. Where there are trees, there are lumberjacks, so of course Gaultier riffed on lumberjack plaids, pairing a tartan silk mousseline blouse with a long tartan jacquard skirt and turning a “chemise Canadienne” (just like it sounds) into a floor-length burnout velvet “robe du soir.” The dominant colors? Shades of brown and green, with splashes of hunter orange on a fox fur vest and a chunky knit cardigan coat that grazed the plank runway. There was even a giant backpack swathed in lace and accented with a full fox pelt.

It’s hard to imagine the couture customer for the high camp of that. What .001 percenter carries her own bags, after all? But if Gaultier doesn’t really have a feel for the woods, he’s certainly not alone in his desire for escape. In that regard, we imagine the fur coat lined in a silver lamé forest-scene jacquard will be utterly transporting for the right somebody.

by Nicole Phelps