The Sphinx Speaks: French Protest Fashion Now

Gentle Reader -

The late, great Diana Vreeland - during her early years at Harper's Bazaar - might have posed this question to the workers of France, who are again protesting:

Why don't you protest in tuxedos and evening gowns, so the government knows this is a real crisis?

You might think this is along the lines of Queen M-A's comment about the populace and cakes. Perhaps.

But think back to 1968, which was really the French Mini-Revolution. Those protesters of 1968 might have smelled terribly, yet they had style.

Alas, sometimes we stand up for rights we might have won, not quite realizing that which we have forever lost.

- AP

Cryptic Mondays: Ancient Fashion

Gentle Reader -

What is currently hot could look strange thousands of years from now.

Make the moment timeless - another cryptic message for this Monday.

- AP

Renaissance Street Fashion

Gentle Reader -

There are quite a few examples of idealized fashion in Italian Renaissance painting. But nowadays, we do not recognize the how startling these pictures might have been to those of the time.

Consider this: in a time when only court fashions were depicted elsewhere in Europe (although there is the rich merchant type), what message these paintings of bourgeois style must have caused.

Sumptuary laws, anyone? Breaking of social codes, perhaps?

Just a passing thought as we are in the transitional weeks between showing Spring-Summer 2011 and designing Fall-Winter 2010-2011.

- AP

After the Shows...Back to Inspiration

Back to the light of Alexandria for a bit of fashion clarity...what new ideas in fashion will be shown in just a few months? What is the feeling in the air for fall/winter 2011-2012? The fashion cycle begins all over again.

- AP

Future Vintage: Chanel P/E 2011

Gentle Reader -

Usually Chanel collections under Karl Lagerfeld are one of the following:

- very Chanel
- very Karl
- very Now

The recent collection for P/E 2011 (that's 'Spring-Summer' for the beginners), was something else entirely: all three at once, and it made for a unique moment in fashion.

Here was a ready-to-wear collection (or more correctly, a limited edition showing) that evoked everything that was exclusively the domain of haute couture alone: lightness, movement, impeccability, and mastery of form. Did I mention that it was even hauntingly beautiful?

This was a collection for the history books - if books will still be around. No, this Chanel collection was not the earth shatter of Dior's 1947 Corolle (ah, the 'New Look') or spellbound opulence of Yves Saint Laurent's 1976 Ballets Russes.

This was a breaking through time, the force of Karl's vision made current fashion look utterly contrived and out-of-date. For those who pre-order, I am sure you have done so already.

- AP

Worth and Poiret: On Fashion

Gentle Reader -


Thanks to Google Books, there is a little treasure that is available from the dusty corners of fashions past: The Principles of Correct Dress by Florence Hull Winterburn (1914). Of special note are the chapters by Jean Worth (son of the great father of haute couture, Charles) and Paul Poiret.

Both men practiced their art at the dawn of fashion's transition from the 19th century to the 20th: a time, though remote in fashion years, that still informs the now.

It's a different world now, but a dress that is becoming on a woman is still the ultimate goal: bear this in mind when looking at the current batch of collections.

- AP