Balenciaga Haute Couture F/W 2021.22 Paris

[avonlea002]

Hasn't Calvin Klein done something like this before? I believe it was Costa and that sweater was posted in the overpriced thread. .

 

[avonlea002]

I found it. S/S 2016


pinterest

 

[badgalcrush]

What looks like a moppy, old sweater from your gran’s wardrobe was actually hand knit chainmail.

Must be heavy as hell woow I did not even realize the fabrics during the show , quite impressive

 

[jeanclaude]

I found it. S/S 2016

Mother of God!!! That Calvin Klein look by Costa is light years ahead from Demna´s!! Modern and sophisticated...I miss Francisco Costa work...

Gvasalia did you copy again??

supergeek.cl

 

[CholoChic]

Very elegant lines and a very pure feeling, I can smell those perfect clothes and I can hear them too.

 

[90sFan]

Beautiful collection. wish I could afford

 

[bc collector]

"...But Demna is no archivist, and the show, although filled with nods to iconic Balenciaga shapes, was not an exercise in nostalgia. The designer reimagined couture essentially as an elevated version, in both fabrics and cuts, of his ready-to-wear with the same menacing, broad-shouldered silhouettes; the same forays into utility or sport; and the same intentionally ungainly, androgynous spirit.

In this sense, the endeavour looked more like a reiteration than a reset, if with greater sophistication. It was all faultlessly executed, but it left one craving for something different, for a bold, unseen proposition. “What interests me right now is making clothes, not fashion,” was Demna’s response to those looking for the shock of the new. Ok. And yet, one might have expected more from such an author. This was a great start, but not a revolution."

Source A.Flaccavento - BoF

 

[Norden]

Angelo always manages to say what I think.

 

[StylishCynic]

La Horyn has spoken.

Who Can Top Demna?
Balenciaga breaks new ground.
By Cathy Horyn.

Over much of his six years as creative director of Balenciaga, Demna Gvaslia has been on a mission to bring fashion into the future. He’s designed molded suits using 3-D printing technology, he’s conceived scenes of climate-spawned disaster, and his models wouldn’t look out of place in a Ridley Scott film featuring robots. In short, his vision is light-years from the ineffable chic of an opera coat in lilac satin designed by the house’s founder, Cristobal Balenciaga.

But this week, Gvasalia, who has had an influence on a sizable portion of the fashion world — for his oversize tailoring and beefed-up hoodies and parkas — indicated he was reversing his jets. The occasion was the debut in Paris of his haute couture collection, the first in the Avenue George V house since Cristobal closed it in 1968 and went home to Spain, where he died four years later, having largely avoided the press.

Facing a throng of journalists, Gvasalia said, “I learned that we cannot look into the future, we need to look into the past to know where we are going.”

This is unquestionably true, but until that moment on Wednesday we’ve seen relatively few examples of a contemporary designer successfully marrying his vision with that of a founder’s — and not just marrying but also expanding our understanding of a brand’s legacy. For me, this was the most remarkable aspect of Gvasalia’s debut, by any measure a triumph. The genius of Balenciaga is hardly hidden — we know about it from books and exhibits, from Penn’s photographs. But compared to the visual knowledge around Chanel, which was helped massively by Karl Lagerfeld, we know very little about Balenciaga and why he still matters. To be sure, Nicolas Ghesquière, in his years as creative director, opened the door, but it was only a crack compared to what Gvasalia, 40, has done.

Let’s consider the accomplishment. Through the small, somewhat degenerate institution of haute couture — the side of the French fashion business that produces handmade, made-to-measure clothes for a few thousand private customers — Gvasalia has exposed, more profoundly than any of his predecessors, the power and allure of the house. He has done so partly by restoring the legendary George V headquarters, using old photographs and the Berlin design firm Sub to remake the original couture salon moldings and furniture. And he has done so partly with his clothes, a distillation of key Balenciaga forms and silhouettes — the semi-fitted suit of the ’50s, for example, the majestic opera coats — that ultimately stress, rightly, the modern eye of Gvasalia.

“He is the most modern designer there is right now,” another top designer told me on Wednesday.

I don’t think there was much doubt about that by the fifth look in the show, a series of rigorously tailored tuxedos and a black cashmere coat in Gvasalia’s over-scaled style. Everything was flawlessly executed, and materials like a compact gabardine (for suiting), vicuna (for ridiculously soft turtlenecks) and silk-wool blends, all with a matte finish, added to the sense of rigor. Outfits would have gone through a half a dozen or more fittings each. It clearly helped that because of delays caused by the pandemic Gvasalia and his staff had more time than is standard to work on the collection. “I was lucky to have a year,” he said. In fact, going forward, Balenciaga will show only one couture collection a year, in July.

It is difficult to work with iconic forms without parking oneself in them, and heaven knows many designers have made successful careers doing just that — tweaking the “codes” of a heritage brand but never really proposing anything new. Not Gvasalia. The vibrant orange loose-back suit in the collection, its jacket seemingly based on Cristobal’s famous fisherman’s blouse, is a stunning example of how he has advanced not just the form, but fashion. And like many of the pieces, notably a modified black opera coat in a kind of dense silk, and a faux silver fox jacket that is embroidered bits of fabric, the suit has a hard-to-define, everyday quality about it.

That opera coat? Shown with jeans made from the finest Japanese denim, it almost feels in the hand like the best sports nylon. The drama, the preposterous glamour of the fat collar — that’s fashion. The balance of the materials and the attitude, so carefully worked out in Gvasalia’s head and by expert hands, is what makes it new.

Now what the hell is he going to do for Balenciaga’s ready-to-wear?

Source: TheCut

 

[jeanclaude]

To be sure, Nicolas Ghesquière, in his years as creative director, opened the door, but it was only a crack compared to what Gvasalia, 40, has done.

A crack?? Crack is what Horyn must have smoked to say something like that!!

 

[TianCouture]

To be sure, Nicolas Ghesquière, in his years as creative director, opened the door, but it was only a crack compared to what Gvasalia, 40, has done.

A crack?? Crack is what Horyn must have smoked to say something like that!!

Was Cathy paid to say this? An utterly humiliating inaccuracy on her moral "reporting." This is a good collection, but lets not pretend this is that much different than his RTW...

 

[Frederic01]

Whilst Ghesquiere had moments in his collections where he paid homage to Balenciaga, those moments were far and few between, particularly in the later part of his tenure, when he went into complete Ghesquiere-80's-futuristic mode.

To be honest though, I see the approach of both Ghesquiere and Gvasalia (in regards to the Balenciaga heritage) to be the same. Both designers combine their own very strong personal design language and incorporate the sensibilities of the Balenciaga language into their respective collections. Ghesquiere had his signature "futuristic" taste, and Gvasalia has his "streetwear" taste, but at the end of the day the approach is the same. What is different about this Couture show is that Gvasalia has really gone back to the essence of tailoring, of couture techniques, and of silhouette, without too much ornamentation and styling excess. Ghesquiere could never achieve something so pure due to his very heavy-handed approach to design.

In regards to what Horyn said, I believe she meant that Demna has "opened the doors" to establishing Balenciaga as an important name in the social and cultural consciousness, whereas previously Balenciaga by Ghesquiere was a very niche high-fashion proposition with a very niche client base.

As much as I despise the streetwear/hypebeast elements of the current Balenciaga collections, I recognise that this was a necessary evil in generating enormous revenues for the brand in order to get to this point now where they have the resources to invest and nurture the Haute Couture side. That is just the reality of the fashion business these days. Chanel and Dior "make money" from Haute Couture, yes, but not hundreds of millions or billions of dollars aka. the kind of money they are intent on making.

 

[jeanclaude]

.
What is different about this Couture show is that Gvasalia has really gone back to the essence of tailoring, of couture techniques, and of silhouette, without too much ornamentation and styling excess. Ghesquiere could never achieve something so pure due to his very heavy-handed approach to design.

Going back to the essence of haute couture, to Demna Gvasalia, means just changing the colour of an archival piece (and making it unflattering compared to the original)

cristobalbalenciagamuseoa.com

 

[Lola701]

There’s something so intellectually dishonest about What Cathy is saying…
She seems to forget the ridiculous circumstances in which Nicolas got the position at Balenciaga. The fact that he joined the house in 1995 but only had access to the archives in 2006.

Demna has the beauty of having all the foundations ready for him to express his talent. Re-opening Couture would have been impossible for Ghesquiere! Balenciaga became profitable only in 2007….
So Pinault would have just invested in an other money consuming activity at that time?

There’s something so dishonest about her comparison because everybody knew that his collections as great as they were, for the majority of them, were a struggle to make.

KERING of today has nothing to do with KERING of back then.

 

[IloveDiorHomme]

I love that review.

I am sure Nicolas Ghesquière and MAS must be so bitter about the success of Balenciaga. It's the brand on everybody's lips...and everybodys's backs or feet.
Demna did better in a couple of years than Nicolas did in more than a decade.

I know those two designers are very different but I can't help myself thinking that Nicolas was designing for the elite, a niche clientèle and this his clothes were not made to fit any body type.
When I watch back some of his work, I find it quite over-designed, too much details and ideas. When Cristobal Balenciaga was the master of generous minimalism.

What is more Cristobal in the end ? Wearing a XXL puffer jacket with a cocoon shape or wearing a technical pair of pants made form 150 patterns and over-"embellished" ?

 

[Lola701]

What is more Cristobal in the end ? Wearing a XXL puffer jacket with a cocoon shape or wearing a technical pair of pants made form 150 patterns and over-"embellished" ?

How about both?
Balenciaga did those rigorous silhouettes but also some very flamboyant dresses with beading and mix of fabrics.

That’s something that both understand well (Nicolas and Demna). All the coats and jackets or even pants I have from Nicolas’s time have that timelessness, rigor and classicism.

I think they speaks the same language with different accents overall. I subscribe more to Nicolas’s vision because I think his clothes stand the test of time more even if the classic pieces from Demna can have that kind of long-lasting power…

But one thing I must admit is that when I wear very old Nicolas jackets, I can’t believe we used to wear such tight clothes!

 

[dfl-001]

Solid.
I love the weirdness of the silhouettes.
But I wish todays designers would cease with the elongated sleeves [ 6,8,22].
I'm going to complain about that forever.

 

[jeanclaude]

What is more Cristobal in the end ? Wearing a XXL puffer jacket with a cocoon shape or wearing a technical pair of pants made form 150 patterns and over-"embellished" ?

Let me think...what about wearing an oversized late 80s/early 90s junkie tracksuit with a logo; and pretending it´s haute couture and Balenciaga related??

 

[StylishCynic]

Out of curiosity, does anyone have the password to access the press materials on the site?

 

[perfect blue]

Makes me wonder what Nicolas could've done with couture at Balenciaga during his prime there.