In Paris, Givenchy, Rick Owens and Isabel Marant dress superwomen
As Paris Fashion Week progresses, a new image of the woman is taking shape, one that is regaining all its strength after three years of pandemic. Whether she is a working girl in a suit and stiletto heels or a rebel in spiked boots, she fears nothing. Designers particularly highlighted her resilience on Thursday through three collections. Givenchy showcased a femme fatale, Rick Owens, an ancient queen and Isabel Marant imagined an ultra-energetic woman.
Matthew M. Williams signed a very elegant collection for Givenchy, reviving the identity of the luxury house through couture pieces in which he injected a contemporary style. The show opened and closed with a series of all-black looks, focusing on sheath dresses that embraced the curves of the body. The silhouettes were elongated with maxi coats with square shoulders in wool, velvet or leather, or by sleeves that flopped over hands and skirts with very high slits up to the thigh.
Even the short square jacket-dresses were lengthened with tulle trains, while floating ribbons ran delicately down the collar of silk blouses. Not to mention the slits plunging down the middle of the chest, cut vertically, leaving just enough space for a pendant.
With just a few flashes of green, yellow and cream colour this predominantly dark collection, was very sexy with ultra-light dresses in transparent pink or mauve chiffon. Fish or flower motifs from the house's archives adorned certain pieces, like the daisies chosen for the jewellery. The designer completed the sophisticated and glamorous wardrobe, punctuated by long opera gloves laced with leather straps above the elbow, with voluminous tailored pieces reworked in a more streetwear style achieved with layering: jackets, overskirts, shorts and cargo trousers.
At Rick Owens, the models seemed to emerge from ancient kingdoms, with their pointed double bun headdresses, their haughty bearing and their majestic silhouettes extended each time by a long train, some of which in denim are torn as if worn by time and battles. The designer says he was inspired by Luxor, a city in the heart of Ancient Egypt. Perched on leather thigh-high boots with reinforced toes and Plexiglas heels, the models slowly crossed the podium raised by metal trestles.
They were dressed in tight knit dresses with wide collars, slit above the thighs, mini-capes, short dresses ruffled with leather straps like the plumage of night birds, sculptural jackets, in which body and head are wrapped in voluminous collars, or in sheath dresses with high pointed shoulders.
The wardrobe of these queens of yesteryear also included monumental down jackets that imprison torsos and arms in thick duvet muffs like large buoys. Several models were covered with matt sequins in tarnished colours (old rose, moss green, wine lees). Rick Owens used recycled or traceable materials for this collection.
A change of register for Isabel Marant, who closed the day with a bang on Thursday evening in the gardens of the Palais Royal, attracting a large crowd to Place Colette. Apart from a few sandals to show off legs moulded in leggings, it is the boots and the ankle boots that define the Isabel Marant girl. Particularly, the three-height zipped thigh-high boots, which this season can be broken down into three parts.
"You get three pairs for the price of one," laughed the designer backstage, who sumed up the spirit of her collection for next winter in two words: "desire and disorder". "It's sexy, but in a subtle way, as always with me, without ever going overboard. It's very cosy and reassuring with a bit of irreverence," she said.
The wardrobe was essentially made up of 3D knitted dresses with twists, or in a simpler version unbuttoned on the side, printed mini-dresses with ruffles, or in leather ready to be unzipped. Matched with a camel coat, a casual anorak with drawstrings or a nice wool double-breasted jacket. The collection also included jeans and trousers with a trompe-l'oeil low-rise effect, some superb denim pilot suits, without forgetting the woolen coats, with side pockets like those you would see on jackets.
In the evening, women shimmer in micro dresses covered in rhinestones. Even leggings were adorned with crystals! Isabel Marant came out to greet the public, accompanied for the first time by her right-hand woman, Dutch stylist Kim Bekker, who has worked for more than ten years in her studio and was appointed creative director in September 2021.
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