Paris in the Fall

Dries Van Noten Fall 2011 (photos from Style.com)
The fall fashion shows recently ended in Paris and I thought that Dries Van Noten presented a great collection. You know I'm a big fan of the Belgian designer, as I've written about him here, here, and here. It was a particularly turbulent season in Paris with the terrible crash and burn of the wildly talented John Galliano who was fired at Dior after being videotaped making shocking anti-semitic remarks in a bar in the Marais, which was historically the Jewish working class of neighborhood of Paris and where Galliano lives. And at the end of the Balmain show, designer Christophe Decarnin, who I have admired here on the blog before, failed to appear. It's said that he was in a hospital having suffered a breakdown. An issue perhaps was the fact that Emmanuelle Alt, who had been his chief stylist and muse for his sexy swaggering looks, was not able to work with Decarnin on this collection as she had been promoted to editor in chief of French Vogue after Carine Roitfeld quit.

In the drama, Dries Van Noten presented a striking collection that looks so chic and wearable. He said in his show notes that he was inspired in part by the style of the Ballets Russes. The result is a creative collage of fabrics which flow together like brush strokes of paint on a canvas. Streaks, swirls and color blocks of cloth make up these artistic compositions.

His use of fabric is asymmetrical so you can see the designer's eye at work, a dash of black and white here, a slash of red and white there.

On the dress below a swath of blue cuts across earthy tones like a wave on a sandy beach.

Below is a close-up detail of the dress at the top of this post. A bright blue field is surrounded by a clash of abstract prints.

This dress has wide kimono sleeves and a line of blue down one side which defines the curve of the body.

In this close-up, the big, slouchy bag doesn't match exactly but still looks perfect. This is an easy elegance.

Here is the long evening version – the same simple t-shirt shape, the collage of pattern, the asymmetrical mix, and a deep leg slit added. It's such a relaxed way to be dressed for evening and also super-chic.

The golden front glimmers against the contrasting patterns in a happy ode to textiles.

And here is Dries at the end of his show.

Beautiful, no?

(Fashion) History Repeats Itself

Millicent Rogers, the Standard Oil heiress and jewelry designer, in a portrait by painter Bernard Boutet de Monvel.

I've been reading about the recent couture shows in Paris. I have to say, I miss the show of Christian Lacroix, the heavenly French designer who whipped up the most fantastic clothes, and recently went out of business.

John Galliano for Christian Dior presented some very Fifties-ish designs that featured a narrow waist and then billowing silk skirts. When I saw it, it reminded me of the tableau of Charles James dresses which opened the recent "Model as Muse" exhibition at the Museum of Metropolitan Art. Here is my photo from my visit last year:

Charles James was the artistic American couturier who was renowned for his sculptural gowns which combined colors in unexpected ways. The heiress and jewelry designer Millicent Rogers was a great client of his. She is pictured at the top of this post in clouds of Charles James' silk which worked well with her strong, bold, abstract jewelry designs.

Then I read on Hamish Bowles' entertaining blog, The Hamishphere, that, yes, in fact John Galliano was inspired by the museum exhibition for his recent Dior couture collection which included complicated ball gowns in structured shapes – a rich confection of lustrous fabrics and jewel colors.
(photos from Style.com)


This collection goes back to Charles James and it goes back to Christian Dior himself who in the Fifties presented the New Look. After the austerity in France of World War ll, Christian Dior created a popular dress silhouette with a narrow waist and a full skirt featuring yards of fabric which spoke to prosperity and abundance: The New Look.

Now, this is the interesting part. In the Fifties, after closing down her fashion house during the war, Coco Chanel returned to the world of fashion. Chanel of course had already revolutionized fashion earlier in the century. In a reaction against stiff and formal Edwardian clothes, Chanel invented comfortable separate pieces – jackets, pants, tee shirts – which followed the lines of the body and allowed for easy movement.

In the Fifties Chanel was again shocked to find women constrained, this time by the corseted waists and crinolines skirts of Dior's New Look. Her answer to it was a new invention: the Chanel suit. Made out of a lightweight tweed, the suit jacket skimmed the body and was edged with embroidery or pearls; it could easily be slipped off and worn over the shoulders like a cardigan. The slim skirt stopped at the knee, assuring that the modern woman could run to catch a cab and sit down in an office chair.

At the recent couture shows, a day after the Dior show, Karl Lagerfeld at Chanel presented this:

A crisp refreshing tonic, a slice of lemon to cut through the sweetness. Hamish Bowles reports that the edges of the fabrics were unpicked and then woven back together so that there appeared to be no seams. Now that's a modern approach, just as Mademoiselle's new suit was in the Fifties.

The Chanel jacket still skims the body.

Evening dresses seem to float.

Karl Lagerfeld is going for a real weightlessness here. Beautiful and wearable.
As in the past, one collection evokes opulence while the other looks to the future.

In Memoriam: While I was thinking about this post came the news that the amazing English designer Alexander McQueen, age 40, had committed suicide. In 2007 his great friend English stylist Isabella Blow died from suicide. It's so sad. Beyond the tragic loss of life, the world of fashion needs so much these fantastically eccentric and imaginative English talents who really work outside the bounds and take us all beyond the basics.

I've Been Tagged

My glamorous blog friend in Hollywood, Lisa Borgnes Giramonti, recently nominated mine as one of her favorite blogs and I'm flattered because she has great taste! See for yourself at her blog A Bloomsbury Life. When you are nominated, the rule is to tell ten things about yourself, and nominate your favorite blogs. Since my blog is about beautiful things, I thought I would list some of my favorites:

Flowers, everywhere and always. (West 12th Street)

Flea market finds.

The work of the mad genius designer John Galliano, whose muse is "the impoverished heiress on the run." (Spring 2010 collection, photo from Style.com)

Running/exercise/yoga/the gym. (the sun deck of the Chelsea Piers on the Hudson River)

The power of New York City

and the bucolic peace of upstate New York, where I am from.
(a summer concert in Herkimer)

The work of Belgian designer Dries Van Noten - quirky and completely cool.
(Spring 2010 collection, photo from Men.style.com)

The paintings of John Singer Sargent. Here we have the Sitwell family, including little Edith in red.

Paris, eternally medieval.

The pleasures of a good book

and, one more, making a beautiful thing

where there wasn't a beautiful thing.
That was fun, thanks Lisa!

Now, I nominate (drum roll, please) some beautiful blogs:
The Aesthete's Lament
What I Saw Today
The Errant Aesthete
A Continuous Lean
Fine and Dandy Shop
Pigtown Design
Mr. Peacock
Easy & Elegant Life
Couturealist