We’re back in the Cour Carrée again, where a surreal giant blooming flower is placed in the center of the venue, co-produced by Philippe Parreno and Hollywood production designer James Chinlund.
The steel trellis structure extending from it is inspired by the intricate structure of the circus, and the golden sci-fi feeling is blowing.
Models paced out of the flowers, and we were transported into an anachronistic, bizarre Louis Vuitton wonderland created by Nicolas Ghesquière.
/out of time /
The term anachronism appears frequently in various interviews with Nicolas Ghesquière. He likes to start a series with anachronism.
“What you thought was normal and classic used to be new.”
Especially when we put the classicist visual notation that Ghesquière excelled at with Thunder, the heroine of Final Fantasy XIII in the 2016 Louis Vuitton advertising blockbuster, “Out of Time” feels even more relevant, and it’s hard not to disagree with Nicolas Ghesquière. Amazed by the foresight and creativity.
In the Louis Vuitton 2020 autumn and winter show, Ghesquière, with the theme of “Anachronism/Anachronism”, presented the dramatic characters from the 15th century to the 1950s, bringing people and things from different eras together in the same time and space, bringing this kind of “Derangement” reassembles into a beautiful narrative.
In the Resort 2023 series, which just ended a few months ago, the sense of time and space culminated in a futuristic building, as if it were a character from “Dune”.
The shoulder line of the architectural silhouette contrasts with the drape of linen and silk, forming the image of a nomadic warrior woman in the desert.
During his tenure as the creative director of Louis Vuitton’s womenswear since 2014, Ghesquière has always perfectly integrated the past, present and future. This concept of time travel and the brand spirit of Louis Vuitton – “travel” – turned out to be ingenious and reasonable. fusion.
In the spring/summer 2023 women’s wear show, this “out of time” arrived as expected, and Ghesquière’s surreal futurism took turns.
This time, though, we’re dealing with an overlap of reality and fantasy.
/proportional imbalance/
When Alice drank the Shrinking Potion, everything around her seemed to grow bigger.
Still starting with Zheng Haoyan, we will find that those “accessory details” that are often overlooked are deliberately enlarged.
The zippers, locks, buckles, belts, and corners of the travel hard case have been enlarged and strengthened one by one. Compared with the normal-sized clothing, the model seems to be Alice who has fallen into the rabbit hole.
Nicolas Ghesquière is a mad hatter who made Alice smaller, once again using outdated means to carry out the futurism of Louis Vuitton womenswear to the end.
Those exaggerated necklines, waists and shoulders are a continuation of the “futuristic female warriors”, and those extra-large accessories are the equipment of female warriors in the fantasy world.
The reason why the futurism expressed by Ghesquière is detached and higher than reality in our eyes is because in his design, the yearning for the future is optimistic and full of endless imagination.
And “imagination” is exactly what Ghesquière wants to show in Louis Vuitton fashion.
We see a psychedelic texture in party pants, as if overturned on a paint tray.
And the reason why it can perform so wonderfully is because the physical strength of the trousers comes from artificial design – created with elastic bands, which is why the three-dimensional effect looks so natural.
Fairy tale humor and tech-savvy futurism can blend so smoothly when imagination is used to the right.
/ female power /
Of course, the unbalanced proportions bring far more than futuristic colors and sci-fi flavors, the femininity brought about by all this is the core of what Nicolas Ghesquière wants to convey to us.
The strong visual impact brought by the huge design breaks the stereotyped gender norms. The words associated with “female” are often closely linked to the concepts of “small”, “weak” and “light”.
Conversely, the design replaces the superficial raised cries with design symbols, and the female power speaks for itself: “‘Pretty tough’ and ‘threateningly beautiful’.
This is the subject of our discussion, so designed to look for something beautiful, sweet, and find their power in these elements. ” Nicolas Ghesquière elaborates.
At the moment when women’s rights are prevalent, Nicolas Ghesquière’s image of future female warriors in Louis Vuitton is still independent and special.
Under the wrapping of the concept of “time travel”, Ghesquière grafted the haute couture techniques with the brutality of post-punk, so that high fashion still retains its European roots in the new stage.
Ghesquière has one foot in history (“We must dig deep”) and one foot in the future (“The future is always fascinating”), coexisting in time travel and digging deeper into women’s clothing.
This is not limited to a certain series, but exists in the longer-term future.