Balenciaga S/S 2012 Paris

[HeatherAnne]

Take everything that was wrong and awful about the 80s, put a futuristic spin on it,and viola Balenciaga S/S 2012 in a nutshell.

 

[mdankwah]

The only thing I like about this collection is the hat.

 

[Rosenrot]

What with all the negativity around here, I can only hope most pieces will make it to the discount racks because it's the only way I can afford to sweep up as many of them as I can. By jove I LOVE those jackets

 

[Salvatore]

I think each piece is potent and styled together, it looks horrible. But I think looking at if from a piece-by-piece standpoint, it's actually cool.

 

[Heroin_Chic]

Not bad.

 

[SnowWhiteDrifted]

I don't love it, and I don't hate it.

I mostly just don't understand what he's trying to say here. The collection doesn't feel cohesive, and it doesn't stand out for me. This looks kind of lazy on Ghesquiere's part.

 

[Northern Star]

Lord give me strength.......this is dreadful. Awful futuristic rubbish, totally unwearable.....well most of it, totally incohesive. I do not get this vision at all, if there is one. Those shorts are hideous and those pockets that look like velcro pouches just stuck on in random places. Not good. Everything looked awkward.

 

[valliaddict]

Fall 2008 was the best collection Ghesquire has ever made. He needs to go back to THAT vibe. I hate these boxy samurai shapes.

 

[Karen0193]

Lord give me strength.......this is dreadful. Awful futuristic rubbish, totally unwearable.....well most of it, totally incohesive. I do not get this vision at all, if there is one. Those shorts are hideous and those pockets that look like velcro pouches just stuck on in random places. Not good. Everything looked awkward.

Oh,yes those pockets were totally unnecessary . The only think I like about this collection is the high-waist pants, the ones without those hideous pockets.

 

[LiranYana]

love the hats and jeans

 

[jeremydante]

this. is. Fashion.

 

[Frida]

Breaking News at Balenciaga

By SUZY MENKES

PARIS — When a fashion show starts with the benches’ collapsing on a high-tech marquetry floor, forcing star guests like Catherine Deneuve and Salma Hayek to stand, you might expect the ultimate flop — or an enforced standing ovation.

But there was other breaking news at the Balenciaga show on Thursday: The clothes were some of the most approachable and wearable the designer Nicolas Ghesquière has yet created.
Overt references to Cristóbal Balenciaga came in the stand-away tailoring and in a vivid stained glass window pattern of Spanish religious figures. The sculpted hats of Mr. Balenciaga’s fisherman father also suggested haute couture’s golden age.
Yet the designer, who came out mouthing “sorry” to his fallen guests, was also true to his own 21st-century culture. It is just that the Neoprene-style jackets standing away from the body were actually made of silk. And the denim pants were precision-tailored with a twist of pleats on a high waist and one strategically planted pocket. They will surely be a red-hot item for the 2012 summer season.
“It’s a labyrinth — I wanted to do marquetry, precious wood and metal, something warmer with the geometry,” Mr. Ghesquière said backstage to explain the graphic effects of the square jackets or a dress cut like two point-to-point triangles. Even when the designer softened up with calf-length dresses, he made an effort (not always achieved) to make them seem modern.
Mr. Ghesquière also explained what he took from the master, including that religious pattern found on a 1960s head scarf. As for the fatally wobbly benches — they also expressed Balenciaga’s geometry in this well-judged show. And the standing audience looked noble rather than harassed, like worshipers in church at the altar of Balenciaga.

Balenciaga: Breaking Away

By CATHY HORYN

Seeing editors tumble to the floor as benches collapsed at Balenciaga this morning was probably not a good way to introduce a collection that was essentially about weightlessness.

After several plastic benches cracked or gave way entirely, the show proceeded in a churchlike mode, with the audience standing as the models breezed past in wing-shaped heels. What may not have been clear from the boxy, broad-shouldered jackets in geometric patterns of topaz, garnet and quartz silk was just how airy and light they were. Nicolas Ghesquiere paired them with blousy track shorts in grainy silks that floated away from the body. This season he scraped off the technical effects; most of the fabrics were silk or cotton, though they might have had the appearance of a novel synthetic. There was stiff ottoman, and fabric embroidered to look like ottoman.

Overall, the collection had more street vitality than in recent seasons, with cool-looking jeans that are black in back or, alternatively, knit in the front with tough work-wear khaki in the back. Indeed, there was a strong utilitarian element in details like a patch khaki pocket on a top, or draped white cotton shirts (they looked and felt like parachute silk) or a new interpretation of Balenciaga’s classic fisherman’s smock. Mr. Ghesquiere has included a sports element in many of his Balenciaga collections, so the track shorts were not a total surprise.

Far more interesting was how he continues to imagine historical Balenciaga in a contemporary context, whether it’s a T-shirt in an archive print that evokes cathedral stained glass or in the volume of a gold silk dress with a zippered black leather waistband. I loved the series of black and white print dresses that closed the show. The shapes had a slight kimono feel, anchored with a wide band of khaki. There’s nothing else like them on the runways, and they’re not complicated or solemn.

nytimes.com

 

[honeyisle]

Not feelin' it yet, especially the Darth Vader hats.

 

[Label Basher]

It's amusing seeing all these names standing around -

ONTD

Standing room only at Balenciaga as front row benches break

Quelle horreur - the fashion pack were forced to stand as a series of benches collapsed at one Paris Fashion Week's hottest shows.

BY Lisa Armstrong 29 September 2011

Not since a chunk of New York ceiling crashed onto Suzy Menkes, The International Herald Tribune's august fashion editor at the Michael Kors show back in 1992 has the audience had the remotest excuse for demanding danger money. But after 19 long, arid years, today's Balenciaga show on the Rue Cassette gave us a chance to prove our mettle.

Balenciaga, may I remind you, is one of the hottest shows of the entire month. It has everything, terrifyingly snotty PRs who make you feel as worthy of admission as a dog turd, obsessively, compulsively shiny floors willing you to break your neck and stupendously uncomfortable, crowded benches.

Oh and amazing, not-sure-what-I'm-looking-at-but-it's-incredible clothes, courtesy of the mighty talented Nicolas Ghesquière.

Today however, the snotty PRs outdid themselves in the sheeny-shiny floor and back-destroying bench department. The first sign that they had over-reached themselves came when one bench upended, sending its entire cargo, including - sacré bleu - former Vogue Paris editor-in-chief Carine Roitfeld. Oh the indignity.

But then a second and third bench went for a burton.

Cue unseemly sized beads of sweat on snotty PR brows. Catherine Deneuve, a woman not known for being a great lover of practical jokes, looked on frostily from her front row perch. Salma Hayek, whose father-in-law Francois Pinault owns Balenciaga, winced - one of her ankles was already in plaster. A decree was issued: for health and safety we would all have to stand for the duration of the show. In our heels. Deneuve glowered rebelliously but eventually stood. As did we all.

Which is why I can't tell you a thing about the show, since the head PR had seated me in the second row - my last review must have offended. I couldn't see a sausage. I had an unimpeded view of the back of Deneuve's hair however. It's very bouncy - she must never get it cut. And I feel like a survivor. War correspondents have 'Nam, Srebrenica and Baghdad. I have Rue Cassette, 2011.

fashion.telegraph.co.uk​

 

[balmain1914]

Anna had a pillow talk with Grace at the show, she liked it? LOL.

 

[helmut.newton]

Does anyone have HQ's from Style.com of the Details? The shoes are amazing! And the fabrics in detail are so interesting.

Also, are they back to showing where they originally did? The set design looks amazing! Its obviously not the Hotel de Crillon. Is it somewhere new?

 

[mackos]

Also, are they back to showing where they originally did? The set design looks amazing! Its obviously not the Hotel de Crillon. Is it somewhere new?

It's their space in 15, rue Cassette where they were showing their collections until S/S 09 and then used as a showroom during the Hôtel de Crillon era. I'm so glad to see them back at the venue as well!

 

[lelaid]

its ok. its probly the most wearable collection nicolas has made in years. however, not crazy about the shoes. one thing i always love in a balenciaga collection is the shoes but i guess its a give and take. shoes or clothes. i miss the days when it was both.

 

[HeatherAnne]

Most-wearable... is that a joke? I feel it's one of the least-wearable Balenciaga collections in recent memory.

 

[Bidwell]

Lisa Armstrong cracks me up!
The collection does not.
HORRIBLE is an understatement. Are the other journalists paid hush money or what??
The pant pleats were the only interesting thing and Armani created those in the early 80's...
Pieces by themselves, maybe. As a vision, bleh. Those lumpy dresses (with lumpy blazers) could only hold some irony for inner city hipsters.