Now there's a snappy phrase in the title there that press releases love to churn out for a highly memorable bitesized chunk. That said, without going into long polemics, overreaching prose and longwinded back stories, sometimes it is as simple as those two words. I've arrived in Paris a day earlier than I normally would for one reason only.
Anthony Vaccarello, with whom you may be familiar with if you're a regular read of the blog, as I've been tracking his work since his early days (he also happens to be a very close friend... yarsh... nepotist alert) presented his A/W 10-11 collection as the first 'show/presentation' to kick of Paris Fashion Week. Being on-schedule for the first time is of course a whole kettle of fish from doing more private showrooms but the static presentation at Palais Royal was most definitely still intimate enough for the throng of people to get up close and personal with Anthony's scope of "urban lingerie". At least I hope they did get up close and personal to really inspect all the details that Anthony had worked into each piece, playing with various opacities of black, going for a subtle texture contrast that isn't immediately detectable unless you start to touch. Once again, these are feats of craftsmanship that I know for a fact Anthony worked his socks off, making because for him, an idea is only half-baked if the finishing doesn't back it up. Hardware has come off the lapels and instead have become giant necklaces that share a geometric symmetry with the clothes.
Having seen the patterns for these pieces, everything is done by strict-ruler precision giving everything a sharpness that actually for the first time, isn't completely untouchable. The sculptural florals of his A/W 09 collection may have been an ask in terms of wearing and those giant gems of last season could also have done some serious physical damage but take these ensembles apart or as they are and these are more open to instant-wearing and slipping into. Or at least for me, it's my kind of apparel for "
You know how much I love backs.... well, when they're this good, they really deserve shots of their own. The one on the right in particular takes the biscuit...
Lou Doillon seems to think so too as she was so enamoured with his work, she very kindly agreed to model the lookbook where I think her own spirit fuses well with that of the collection...
(Photography by Julia Champeau)
Honestly, I could *tear* up a little but that would be sad and pathetic considering it's only the first day of Paris fashion week. I'm crossing my fingers for Anthony on several accounts and next season, it will be veeeeery exciting and I'm incredibly grateful that I've been able to track the progress until the point where probably blog posts like this one will stand redundant against the mountains of hyper-high-end-press.
