Armani Prive HC S/S 06 Paris

[Lena]

over all I think it's pretty lame. Or at least very expected.

i find this horribly wrong, doent even look HC to me.. feeling too sad for Giorgio Armani..
and i wont even start on those silly hairstyles

thanks for all the pics posted

 

[Boomer]

oh i love hana's outfit most,maybe that's because i love hana most? anyway i like this collection...very soft and womenly. plus i see the valentino resemblance too.

SO great to see Hana there! Made my day!
Has she done the couture shows before?

 

[eternitygoddess]

This is the best HC collection Armani has done yet. I love that he's using more color. But like someone said, it's very very Valentino.

 

[Ceptuouse]

From vogue.co.uk

THERE are several things you can rely on Giorgio Armani for - one is luxury, the other is starting on time. Once more there was the scramble to fit in the 'highstreet does couture' wardrobe crisis, full continental breakfast (well, you need to set yourself up for the day), plus locate a taxi all before the very strict 09.30 start. Yikes.

This January marks his third 'couture' presentation. Privé - private - the Italian's answer for 'it's made only for you'. Unlike other seventy-somethings, this designer gets more creative as he gets on, launching Armani Privé on to the runway in January 2005. Proof indeed that he has too many ideas to retire, and far too many clients to let him - as they want dressing for the red carpet and, more importantly, drop-dead gorgeous daywear occasions.

Past the model-proportion pinboard holders and up to his tiny salon we went, to find two black rows each side of the un-raised metallic edged runway. This was Armani intimate and up-close and, although in Paris, the slick setting transported you to the luxury of his homeland and all he symbolises.

Opening with daywear, pantsuits, the Armani woman was offered crepe fitted jackets with a silk grosgrain lapel and bustle at the back set off against the cigarette pant, or a light wool jacket with shell-like chiffon ruffles round the hem to start. A lilting Italian soundtrack for the girls that sauntered by in suits ideal for Lady Helen Taylor, Charlotte Rampling and Sophia Loren - three of his well-known clients who attended his second show. The clothes were classy, chic, and for women who know how to work a room as much with wit as with her figure.

Armani doesn't design to the thrill of the flash bulb paps - how vulgar - his designs are cleverer than that. In them women are mesmerising - the epitome of a modern day siren, understated yet there was no denying the luxury and in that understating Armani knows how to attract all eyes. And they say women specialise in reverse psychology. Laminated black Sicilian lace peeking through a tight fitting black jacket, a pinstripe pantsuit with stripes that worked to tailor and corset the female form. What he concealed became all the more alluring through his cut.

Ultra feminine bow-fronted ties on fitted jackets with cigarette pants, oyster satin slips that slunk off the body, puffs of satin, or ripples of chiffon that fell down strapless fishtail fitted dresses in watery lilacs, black or hot pink: shapes were body-conscious as well as kind. Organza evening dresses were embellished with ribbons and flounces, jet beads embroidered onto a new take on le smoking so every step caught the light, and buttery satin corolla-shaped gowns were every bit what you would expect a couture outfit to be. Workmanship and restrain embellished every piece yet all remained true to the spirit and crusade of the master of understated chic. (January 23 2006, PM)

By Camilla Morton

 

[Ceptuouse]

pictures now up here at vogue.co.uk

 

[Faith Akiyama]

^Excellent! Thanks for the tip!

 

[J'aime_la_mode]

Ooh This Was So Worth The Wait!!!

 

[Faith Akiyama]

Every time I see Emina's dress again, I fall in love with it 100 times harder

 

[Boomer]

Amazing that the Vogue photog got the reflection off the floor!! God, I see snapshots better planned than that! Shame on you!!

 

[aistobasbistoc]

I'm not sure you can really differeniate between this and one of his rtw collections, there's finer detail, and material, no artistic divergement. Predictable, but for some people it works.

 

[Heri]

pictures now up here at vogue.co.uk

OMG I absolutely love these two... just fantastic! The first one is my fav... so lovely!

 

[Boomer]

Anyone know who some of the models are? I see Hana Soukupova and a couple of others but I don't know most of them! (And they are all good, too!)

 

[Faith Akiyama]

^I only recognize Emina and Hana...

 

[Caffeine]

it's so wearable and classic. I love it. I am curious if and in what degree their couture customer base overlap with Dior Couture's customer base...

 

[overlock]

if dynasty were still around today the actresses would wear this.

 

[Tinuviel]

armani just doesn't do it for me.

 

[ADFoF]

International Herald Tribune's Suzy Menkes:

It was left to Giorgio Armani to make a fine fist of Reality Couture - meaning clothes that could slide seamlessly into the lives of people who want to look sweetly smart by day, in sculpted jackets, flaring at the rear, and a simple pair of pants or skirt. At night, the Armani Privé client will look coolly glamorous in red carpet dresses with great exit lines, from the cut-away backs, with crystals sparkling on bared flesh, to ruffles cascading like a gentle ocean wave. If you removed the corkscrew cocktail hats and took away an evening gown with a skirt that looked like an upturned, unfurling parasol, this was a collection of polite and appealing clothes.

In the year since he launched Privé, Armani has lightened up, as though he is now less nervous to walk the sacred cloisters of haute couture. He admitted as much when he said: "I liberated myself from my complexes."

That meant that the clothes flowed gracefully from the pinstriped pantsuit in a harmony of graphic crisscrosses through the buckled bandolier cross-strap sunk into the tailoring to inserts of lace, creating back interest. Although Armani's studio hands occasionally seemed to place seaming where a dress should have melted and melded into an effortless bias cut, the designer has made an elegant and successful entry into the couture scene.

With his regional ambassadors - mostly pretty blondes like the British royal family's Lady Helen Taylor - sitting front row, his eternal flame Sophia Loren summed up the show. Sitting in a pantsuit that only enhanced her 70-year-old curves, the Italian star said: "It was so beautiful, so wonderful for women, for an actress or for more ordinary people."

 

[peacelover142002]

the collection's up at style.com:

PARIS, January 23, 2006 – With the relevance of haute couture gaining traction in the race toward the Academy Awards, Armani Privé revved impressively on the starting line. The dress Ziyi Zhang recently wore at the Golden Globes reminded a generation of young women about Giorgio Armani’s delightfully uncomplicated, but high-impact appeal. And this collection followed through with a lot more in that line: delicate dresses, pantsuits, stunning jackets, beaded gowns, and beiges of the sort that made women fall in love with him from the year dot.

Armani is at his best when he lays off the hats and bags, i.e., when he’s not trying to perform to the done-up Parisian standard. A couple of slight halter dresses in nude, oyster, and mushroom with vertical pleats running through the front and falling into narrow chevron-beaded skirts were deliciously light-handed. A sparkling silver sequined blazer and a rigorous black lace bolero with lean, high-waist matador pants came loaded with all the couture-grade handwork a girl could dream of, yet still looked believably modern.

True, you had to turn a blind eye to some sallies in hot pink and coral tiers, as well as a sudden outburst of fussy 3-D geometric pleating, but even those couldn’t distract from the impact of two brilliantly simple bugle-beaded pajama pantsuits. Vintage Armani, they were a stroke of genius that showed him—in this moment of eighties revivalism—knowingly reprising himself. As a red-carpet alternative for a young starlet, either of those could be the coolest choice out there.

– Sarah Mower

 

[peacelover142002]

detail shots, style.com:

 

[peacelover142002]

more:

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