The movement that began in Milan becomes full-blown in Paris: men’s fashion rediscovers elegance and formality, notions long neglected if not downright vilified. If the shift, on the one hand, refreshes after garrulous seasons of clownish pseudo-realism, on the other it also indicates a return to a certain conservatism. The collective imagination – we could say – turns right, that’s it, but it’s not all or just restoration. Rick Owens mixes formality and debauchery in a test of explosive power and absolute stylistic rigour. The fashion show takes place on a raised catwalk – like the shows of yesteryear – amidst the smoke, and is almost entirely black, with high waists, midi skirts – skirts, yes: cleared for men, forever – the shoulders pointed toe and heels that further lengthen the draculistic and vertical silhouette. The Victorian reference is explicit and intentional, because, Owens says, “the moralism of that historical moment is equal to the current one”, but it is cut by touches of, are always his words, “corrupt seventies pseudo-spiritualism”. That is: injections of tattered denim, poured make-up, and a quivering energy that we could define as sexual that blows everything upside down. The opposition of forces produces an elegant and furious sign, formal and not at all reassuring, which is one of the peaks of the season.
And Givenchy, Matthew Williams opens with four impeccable dresses, with wide shoulders and a clean line, made in the atelier in homage to the couture roots of the maison, but soon returns to the territories more familiar to him of urban stratifications, tattering from the asphalt jungle, of a certain laissez faire as a cool figure. The two languages are rarely spoken and little amalgamated, but the initial intuition is right to be.
In a flawless suit and latex gloves, the killer of Louis Gabriel Nouchi is inspired by the film American Psychobut also expresses a nice expansion of ages and body types.
The man Saint Laurent in Anthony Vaccarello’s vision he is dressed in black, thin, elongated, with firm shoulders and a bow around his neck; he wears a large silver bracelet on the sleeves of his trench coat, has a hood draped over his frozen hair and wears wide trousers that look like sweatpants, very long sweaters, martial coats; he appears fragile and unattainable, very romantic: a pure fantasy, vibrant with yearning. Definitively freeing himself from the model set by his predecessors, Vaccarello imprints an authorial sign, playing on androgyny which is the founding code of the maison. If she, in Saint Laurent, steals his tuxedo, so he can steal mileage trench coats, bracelets and tunics from her. It is the naturalness of this fluid code that convinces, together with the conciseness, the absence of smudges, the obsession with elegance.
And Louis Vuitton the synthesis is in no way contemplated; on the contrary, voices and directions are mixed. In homage to the aggregative spirit of the never forgotten Virgil Abloh, the collection is in fact a choral opus that involves, in addition to the internal stylistic team, Colm Dillane, mastermind of the American brand Kidsuper, the directors Michel and Olivier Gondry, the stylist Ibraham Kamara, the Ukrainian creative Lina Kutsovskaya, and Rosalia performing live on the catwalk. The choice of the adult-child theme is interesting, but finding a common thread and interpreting it is very difficult, and what remains are above all things, objects, and a lot of entertainment.