StyleZeitgeist x GUIDI Collab

Fashion

For its latest collaboration the storied leather goods maker GUIDI has teamed up with its old friend, StyleZeitgeist magazine. The resulting product is one of long-standing mutual respect and trust in each other’s understanding of a shared esthetic and cultural values.

Ann Demeulemeester on Her New Perfume

Fashion

It seems rare these days that an independent designer launches a perfume. They now tend to come either from niche perfumery houses, corporate brands, or legacy fashion brands that are not owned by beauty conglomerates. Which makes the new Ann Demeulemeester perfume, titled simply “A,” an event in its own right, not to mention the fact that it gives Demeulemeester’s friends another reason to revisit her work.

Op-Ed: Phoebe Philo Does Not Exist

Culture, Fashion, Features/Op-Ed

In his seminal 1981 book Simulacra and Simulation the French philosopher Jean Baudrillard posited that in our postmodern world we no longer live in reality – meaning, we do not process our world directly and immediately, but in hyperreality – a world created by and mediated through a system of signs and symbols. In other words, we live in a simulation – via screens, through social media, soaked in a semiotic system created by the vast leisure industry – entertainment, news, advertising, and so on. The simulacrum of reality makes the direct experience of reality impossible because our brains are so full of received messages that we are only able to process and reference reality through them – like a twenty-four-hour Disneyland (or the Matrix), or like a 1:1 scale map overlaid onto the real world.

MAN RAY AND FASHION AT MOMU

Fashion

We tend to think that the fashion and art symbiosis is a relatively new thing, birthed by the late ‘90s and early ‘00s collaborations between Marc Jacobs and artists like Stephen Sprouse, Takahashi Murakami, and Yayoi Kusama. In fact, the relationship (as well as the tension) between modern fashion and art is as old as modern fashion itself. Its arguable progenitor, Charles Frederick Worth, deemed himself an artist. He compared himself with the painter Eugene Delacroix and put on artistic airs (down to wearing a type of a beret favored by Parisian painters), setting the model for the generations of fashion designers that came after him. From Paul Poiret to Coco Chanel to Elsa Schiaparelli and beyond, designers either cultivated friendships with or collaborated with artists.

Op-Ed: The Next Act of the Gvasalia Brothers Circus

Fashion, Features/Op-Ed

When in 2014 Vetements burst onto the scene with their updated take on Margiela, it billed itself as a collective in a nod to the master of self-effacement. Soon enough though, the Gvasalia brothers decided that it was their show after all – Demna became its creative figurehead and Guram its business one. Just a year later, the hype surrounding the brand landed Demna a creative director position at Balenciaga, where he quickly proceeded to ruin the its reputation as a storied couture house by pumping out logoed hoodies, logoed denim jackets, logoed sweaters, logoed sneakers, and even logoed tailoring. Soon enough, what with Demna getting all the spotlight, the two brothers fell out. In 2019 Demna left Vetements, and in 2021 he dropped his last name, without offering a compelling reason for doing so. (Could it be that the brothers’ hatred for each other ran so deep that it extended to Demna’s desire to drop his family name?) He also moved from Zurich to Geneva

OP-ED: IS HAUTE COUTURE MODERN?

Culture, Fashion, Features/Op-Ed

The haute couture week that just ended in Paris took place amidst the riots caused by police killing an Arab youth. In such a setting, showing ultra-expensive clothes to a bunch of ultra-rich women who descend on Paris twice a year for the haute couture week to throw money around felt a bit like the last ancien regime masked ball before the guillotines are rolled out. Only Celine displayed some sensitivity towards Paris, its people, and its own staff and canceled its show. For the rest, evidently, the show must go on.

NOTES ON PARIS FASHION WEEK, SPRING / SUMMER 2024 MEN’S

Fashion, Features/Op-Ed

Thinking back on this past Paris menswear season, I realize that it held few surprises. This is not a criticism. Lately, I have been thinking that as fashion increasingly becomes driven by celebrity and hype, the only thing left to do is to support those who produce genuinely creative work. This season they unanimously delivered strong collections, work that was strong in expression and full of conviction that they must stick to their guns as the world around them grows increasingly coarse and cynical.

Speaking of which, let’s get the gross spectacle that Louis Vuitton put on to celebrate Pharrell’s coronation as the new creative director of its menswear. To be fair, there were actually few cool looks in there – I, for one, was not mad at the Minecraft print. But most of it was exactly what Louis Vuitton wants, logo-driven drivel, the kind of lowest common denominator stuff squarely aimed at the masses consumed by conspicuous consumption.

The clothes, however, were not the most off-putting part; the cabaret show with which they were presented was. It was a pure power exercise; power over Paris, power over the fashion industry, power over its media, power over contemporary culture. For half a day a private company closed Pont Neuf, a major Parisian public bridge in the city center, so it could put on a celebrity-fashion industrial complex circus, bringing attendees to the show by boats, and essentially keeping them hostage for four hours. Perhaps in Louis Vuitton’s opinion everyone craves to be at a private Jay-Z concert, and considering the number of the blurry I-WAS-THERE! pictures of the rapper – taken in the hope that celebrity pixie dust will rub off – they weren’t entirely wrong. But they weren’t entirely right either. In the next few days I spoke with more than one editor who was quietly angry that Louis Vuitton simply assumed that they had no better place to be. What the brand signaled, I told them, is that they own them, and so the editors are expected to kiss the ring.