Center Stage: The Future
At the house of Yves Saint Laurent, a very nervous Alber Elbaz, the new resident designer, made a strong debut this week as he took on the legacy of YSL in his first ready-to-wear Rive Gauche collection. Saint Laurent, 62, created the line 33 years ago but now designs only couture.
“I was scared to death about the collection,” the 37-year old Israeli American designer said in an interview after the show. “When I started to design it, I wondered, ‘What is it that women want?’ The answer was clear, the idea of fashion is to dress women, not undress them. So I wanted to keep the very classic Saint Laurent look but at the same time also make it a look of today so that the new generation doesn’t have to go to the flea market and find that stuff.”
He also wanted to empower women, he said, recalling the conversation he had with Pierre Berge, YSL president, who selected him last spring to succeed Saint Laurent.
“Mr. Berge told me, ‘Alber, Coco Chanel gave women liberty. Mr. Saint Laurent gave them power.’ ”
What did Elbaz give women?
“Strength, “ he said. “The collection should make women, especially young women, look strong. They should wear the pants, but in high heels.”
Elbaz excused himself to receive a call. YSL had phoned from his home in Marrakech, Morocco. Berge said Saint Laurent decided to stay away from Paris during fashion week, “because today is Alber’s day, not Saint Laurent’s day.”
Elbaz hid behind a backstage curtain as he chatted with Saint Laurent on a mobile phone. When he emerged he said Saint Laurent “called to say he was ‘very happy for me.’ To hear him say that makes me happy because my intention with this collection was to be faithful to Mr. Saint Laurent and to be faithful to myself.” But, he added, “I didn’t want to do Alber Elbaz for Yves Saint Laurent. I wanted to do Yves Saint Laurent by Alber Elbaz.”
He was true to his word.
After poring through some 40 years of YSL archives, Elbaz was moved to include several of the master’s trademarks--knickers, huge skirts, big bows, vivid colors and the tuxedo.
Elbaz showed a rainbow of bright, almost neon hues: orange on a satin wrap, pink pants with pink shoes, royal blue blouse and matching pants, and a blue and orange evening gown. He carried out Saint Laurent’s credo of giving women power by putting them in pants and presented a string of elegant man-woman tuxedos: The most avant-garde was a tux jumpsuit with a plunging neckline.
That was Elbaz’s cue to hit the runway in a tuxedo as he took his bows. The stunning Catherine Deneuve left her front row seat and ventured backstage in her YSL sunglasses to congratulate the designer with the disheveled Einstein hair. As other well-wishers gathered around him and planted congratulatory kisses, he asked: “Did you like? It wasn’t too bad, was it? It wasn’t too intellectual?”
“No, no, no, no” came the replies.
In this city of light, other designers showed this week with varying degrees of luminescence. None shone brighter than Japanese designer Yohji Yamamoto.
With an actual shirt sleeve serving as his show invitation, Yamamoto hinted that he would emphasize his specialty, the white shirt. They were backless, French-cuffed, high or pointy-collared or simply unbuttoned. The clean look had the fashion press whispering their appreciation as the suit parade floated by.
His new suits are minimalist but with his trademark inventive and complex tailoring. He tweaked the coats, with drawstring waists, unusual pockets or sleek satin trim. He paired them with column skirts, tight skirts and full, billowing pleated skirts, including one that was pleated cashmere in the front, velvet in the back. Length? Take your pick: short, ankle or to the floor.
And romance--as in “Shakespeare in Love”--came center stage with liquid velvets, sweeping skirts and off-center capes and cloaks, part Victorian, part Gothic chic, ranging from simple wraps to swashbuckling swaths in blood red, green, grape and tangerine that were elaborately draped over bodies.
At Louis Vuitton, American designer Marc Jacobs’ third collection for the luxury goods maker had the audience buzzing about the bags. Inspired by the world-famous LV logo luggage, the bags were Godzillian--a humorous departure from Jacobs’ tiny offerings last season.
Naomi Campbell and other models camped it up for the audience (which included LVMH Moet Hennessy Louis Vuitton Chairman Bernard Arnault, who has taken a rather unwelcomed stake in Gucci) with skunk fur coats, blanket ponchos (they were actually rugs made of the finest Scottish wool) and all those embossed bags and luggage--including wheeled suitcases and a hiker’s backpack complete with a bedroll--in red, green and purple patent leather.
At Louis Vuitton, It’s Time to Party
Backstage, Jacobs explained his collection was all about tongue-in-cheek chic.
“I get amused when I’m in Paris,” he said, his hair pulled back with a headband, a shirt tied around his waist. “I think of Pepe Le Pew, and so I did the skunk look” in a cape. “I wanted to have fun with this collection. It’s all about having a great sense of whimsy, having a party.”
Well, at Louis Vuitton prices, a party for the jet set girl.
And this party girl will be flying in dresses with handkerchief hems, skirts in square shapes wrapped around the body and trousers in many varieties: paper-bag, Hollywood-waisted, pajama and tuxedo style. .
The party girl also will have piles of cashmere, metallic pants paired with jackets and lots and lots of sweaters, some with detachable sleeves and others with zippered turtlenecks.
Like his bags, Jacobs didn’t sacrifice size with his jewelry. He accessorized with big, chunky wooden bracelets that looked like Jolly Green Giant washers, in stacks of 6,7 and 8. Who needs weights for workouts?
When pressed by television reporters about his collection, he said, “It’s not 1950 anymore. You shouldn’t be asking questions anymore about color and length. Fashion for me is ‘whatever.’ I don’t make clothes for myself. I make them for other people to like.”
Ennio Capasa, designer for Costume National, a cutting-edge company he and his brother, Carlo, have operated for 11 years, agreed. One look at his collection, and you know it’s not for everyone. It is, however, perfect for the Los Angeles trendoid or dominatrix.
For starters, his futuristic, avant-garde collection includes lots of leather coats, pants and sleeveless and backless waist-hugging tops in muted purple and green as well as black.
Black suede long-sleeve shirts were slit from the elbow to the knuckles. Sleeveless tops and several dresses were adorned with rows of fish-scale leather sequins that danced down the runway.
Skintight trousers had off-centered zippers and were way below hip level, revealing models’ rear cleavage in black jeans paired with backless silk tops fastened with industrial straps.
Shouts of ‘Horrible!’ at Christian Dior
Capasa, like other designers, is always on the search for new techno fabrics. The latest: A wool yarn mixed with pulverized glass. It is harmless on the body but deadly as a fashion statement.
“I tried to make my collection a mix of the past and future. I call it Mad Max chic,” Capasa said backstage after his show. His clothes are worn by Meg Ryan, Kevin Spacey, Tom Cruise, Nicole Kidman, Shirley Manson of the rock band Garbage, and other celebs. He is hoping to open a Costume National shop in Los Angeles next year.
“L.A. is the first place that noticed me and my clothes,” Capasa said. “We have a good vibe--L.A. and me--because in L.A. there are lots of creative people that understand style and fashion.”
John Galliano’s collection for Christian Dior prompted a German magazine fashion editor to stand and announce, “This is horrible!” Several around her nodded in agreement, disappointed as models in short pigtails took over the Dior salon in tight awkward-fitting bibbed and backless overalls or in sweaters that looked as if they had been made of translucent plastic.
Other sweaters, pullovers and some cardigans with sailor collars looked comfortable and stylish. The most beautiful were the oversized slouchy, popcorn knit cardigans that buttoned in back and were teamed with long, lean skirts also back buttoned to the ankle.
