Bottega Veneta S/S 2022 Detroit

[Frederic01]

Bottega Veneta

 

[Fulton St Critique]

I already Tweeted this but I viewed this as a type of homage to American sportswear. The resulting work failed to reach an impact though. The colorful paillettes reminded me of Studio 54, and the workwear take’s were undeniably a call to Detroit’s industrial roots, but there was very little if any fashion happening here. I enjoyed the crinkled fabric- reminds me of Dries’s first collections with those wrinkled satin dresses- and the tactility of the knit, but I was left wanting more. I guess that is my problem right? Expecting something great from such a limited creative is like wishing upon a dream that will most likely never come true. At least we saw the puddle boots, I guess…

 

[Frederic01]

The womenswear was fantastic, even if it was a little deja-vu with previous seasons, and the casting was really interesting, but as usual the menswear was absolutely terrible. It was too oversized, too shapeless, and a non-event to be honest. It really weakened the proposition of the show to the point of being distracting and completely unnecessary.

I don't understand why the Bottega woman gets to be sleek/chic and wear beautiful tailored clothing, but the Bottega man is forever condemned to wear oversized denim, nylon parkas, and plastic gumboots? And after Lee made such progress in the last few seasons with the menswear offering. Such a shame...

 

[HelgaZ]

I wonder if this was done on purpose? Terrible shooting, nothing is visible, figures are cut to the chest, no silhouettes are visible. Men's clothing is horror. Women's clothing is still white, but what are these color combinations - green, orange and blue at the same time? What is it? Absolutely nothing is clear. Show me your f*cking clothes. The cameraman was drunk or .. what? That look with a green, uh, blanket was a total trash, a man in bright green, shoes, as always, ugly. So, I'll wait for the photo. Shooting is a disaster.

 

[dontbeadrag]

I usually enjoy something from Bottega, but this one was weird, some pieces are almost really nice, but they just don't hit that sweet spot. Towel dresses, men's parkas and Lourdes were ridiculous. Madge, your daughter is not a model, please stop this right now before she embarrasses herself even more. If that is not her, because the shooting is terrible - that person in the black minidress should retire ASAP. The cast in general is like... Anybody knows how to walk? How to have any poise at all? Absolutely spot-on for the current Gen Z and early millennials in the majority - loads and loads of arrogance and self-entitlement to everything, but zero substance or actual experience to back it up, which in combination looks silly and repulsive.

The cast + clothes come off as you going to the posh place or party, and people there are just empty and have nothing to say, except that "Bro, these shoes are Bottega". I know a lot of these people.

 

[HelgaZ]

^^^
Madonna's daughter is so "talented", so, I don't remember her at all.

 

[TianCouture]

Honestly this is bad. And the first Marilyn Monroe looking dresses are so oddly Alaia looking...

 

[YohjiAddict]

^Yes! I also thought it was so very Alaïa, which is weird considering how masculine some of Daniel's other shows have been...

 

[THD96]

It's a good collection. He tone down his use of usually gimmick ugly details, and present a really straightforward and easy to sell clothes.

My favorite looks are the opening look and the printed dress on Soo Joo. I love all the techniques that he used on his knitwear. His knitting patterns make his clothes very easy to recognize without relied on the easy route of logos.

I like his more traditional feminine dresses that he introduced in this collection. It's a nice additional touch to his usual silhouettes.

The menswear is decent, some looks are lackluster but they still on theme with the womenswear.

 

[Lola701]

Very Alaia….
It somehow makes sense since Blazy’s boyfriend is Pieter.
This collection really represents the season in a way. A lot of volumes, a desire of drama, some very energetic moments, some colors and shine but it’s not really a success.

I like the sequins and the parkas but overall, it looked like a slightly elevated Jacquemus! A much more pretentious, complicated Jacquemus.

 

[gossiping]

casting ruined it (like valentino's show in pfw) what is that about? put these clothes on real models!

there are some nice looks i guess.

 

[susseinmcswanny]

No comment on the clothes.

Now I don't wanna be the one... but I think this whole Detroit thing is really inappropriate. Like Galliano's homeless collection type behavior. Having Daniel Lee and his 5 figure garment selling company come into one of the most impoverished cities in America to cosplay and ask "What's American?", hosting a "salon", makes no sense to me at all. Detroit (or anything in relation to the question "What's American?" for that matter) has nothing to do with Daniel Lee or Bottega Veneta. No one in Detroit can afford this stuff besides the gentrifiers and the people that want to visit so they can have an "edgy experience". The people of Detroit need a TON of help. They do not need Kering coming in using their city as a prop to have an "exotic" make believe party moment to market and sell tchotchke overpriced garbage. Maybe I am overreacting, I feel like this is just I could go on and on

 

[Frederic01]

Review from Vogue Runway, including some more information about the choice of location.

Hello, Detroit.

Early on in the pandemic, Bottega Veneta announced a new show model: Milan was out, and off-schedule salon-style shows were in. Creative director Daniel Lee would take his collections on the road and engage with both local talents and local audiences in the cities where the brand posted up. First was London, his home base, last October. A show at Berlin’s Berghain nightclub followed in April. Salon 03 was staged tonight at Detroit’s Michigan Theatre, a 4,000-something-seat movie palace built amid Detroit’s spectacular automotive-fueled boom in the 1920s that was converted into a parking garage during its even more spectacular 1970s bust.

Mary J. Blige and Lil’ Kim were among the stars who jetted in to watch. From New York, a planeful of reporters, magazine editors, and stylists, plus the young designers Peter Do and Hillary Taymour made the trip too. For many, if not most of them, it was their first time in the Motor City. Curiosity about Detroit, and about what Lee and co. could get up to here, were the attractions.

Writing in The Atlantic in 2011, Ta-Nehisi Coates pointed out, “Over the past few years, Detroit, the blackest big city in the country, has been hot with reporters and film-makers who’ve assigned themselves the work of comparing the city’s mythical past against its precarious present.” A decade later, unlike New York or LA, it’s still the kind of place that has something to prove. Enter Bottega Veneta and Daniel Lee.

“I’m obsessed with Detroit,” he said after the show. “I first came here six years ago and fell in love with the place. I’m from Leeds, it’s the industrial heartland of the UK, and Detroit being the industrial heartland of America, I feel this kind of connection.” Then there’s the music thing: “Detroit really is the birthplace of techno, and techno was the music that I was growing up to and going out to. I wanted to use my position to shine a light on all of that. ”

The day’s events included a culture tour that included stops at the mid-century Hawkins Ferry House in Grosse Point; the world’s first and only Techno museum, Exhibition 3000; and the studio of the industrial designer Chris Shanks, who is among the Detroiters who made installations for Bottega’s three-month pop-up shop at a decommissioned firehouse in the city’s Corktown neighborhood. The techno creatives Moodymann and Carl Craig were responsible for the sonic components of the show.

Lee has made a strong impression in his three years at Bottega Veneta. Fashion’s first-movers we’re quick to pick up his softly constructed Pouch bag and wear his square-toed heels, and the trickle-down effect has been noticeable from the accessories floors of high-end department stores to the high street. That hemlines have risen and fashion has turned toward sexier silhouettes are arguably part of the Lee effect too.

Given his choice of venue, he said he asked himself, “What’s American?” It was definitely the sportiest collection he’s shown so far, with tennis whites, dark rinse jean jackets and skirts, and track suits engineered in a crosshatch check knit meant to imitate the house signature intrecciato motif. A pair of white dresses had the 1950s halter neck va-voom of Marilyn’s famous Seven Year Itch dress, only Lee paired them with sneakers.

In spite of the sportswear and workwear influences, there was a lot of interest at the level of the fabric. “For me,” Lee said, “Bottega Veneta is really a house of technique.” The season’s elevating, couture-ish details came in the form of intarsias and embroideries of a Tyrone Lebon photograph of Mica Arganaraz circa spring 2020 in nothing but Bottega’s sparkly pumps—a clothes-as-canvas kind of proposition. And much of the outerwear was shot through with metal threads, which gave the anoraks and blouson jackets and the pants they were worn with the glossy color and kinetic dimensionality of John Chamberlain’s old car sculptures. Chamberlain rejected the metaphors that were heaped on his art, but could give as good as he got. He once said of his work, “it goes from being the waste source of one being to the life-source of another.” In the glorious wreck of the Michigan Theatre that idea resonated.

 

[mepps]

^^^
Madonna's daughter is so "talented", so, I don't remember her at all.

You remembered her enough to make a comment about her, while never mentioning the actual fashion show.

 

[dior_couture1245]

The cool factor here is so over. I knew it was hollow to begin with, but I didn't expect it to fizzle so fast. Should have known.

The only look I like is the sparkly green cardigan and skirt with the orange shoulder bag (hate the shoes, though).

For how "funky" these clothes and accessories are, they could not be more personality-less. Nothing here has a soul. Nothing here means anything, no matter what the show-notes say. And looking at the front row in the previous season collection...NO ONE looks good wearing this crap. It's so bad.

His whole schtick bugs me so much. It's so pretentious and so phony. So tired of this kind of aesthetic of "cool" gallerista.

 

[GivenchyHomme]

What I’ve noticed is that he is not as smart or interesting as he thinks he is. His collections have no narrative. What is the underlying message? He’s certainly no JW or Miuccia in that regard. He’s in Detroit, a city with such a vibrant history. Where is that in this collection? The gradual decline of the American auto industry or the rise and fall of Motown? And I don’t just mean by metallic fabrics reminiscent of cars or sparkly disco dresses, but rather a feeling. An optimism that was always doomed to fade. Everytime I see collection that is supposed to take on a theme I can’t help but think of what a great designer could have done with it. Could you imagine what Dior era Galliano could have done with an inspiration like Detroit? Instead we have an accessory designer regurgitating the same lifeless clothing over and over again. For all the noise made about this I would expect to see something magical. Instead we got something mediocre and unimaginative. The power of marketing such mediocrity is going to be the death of the fashion industry. Phoebe Philo your time is now!

 

[perhydrol]

Daniel Lee's perception of fashion and culture, in general, must be incredibly superficial. To be honest, I don't believe a single word of his about the choice of Detroit. I think they went there just because it became kind of 'trendy' among people similar to Lee or, in other words, it's getting more and more gentrified. That's why the collection didn't reflect the atmosphere of the city. It was literally the same with Berlin, they went there because they wanted to show how alternative and COOL they are, or pretend to be. Another thing is the soundtrack that somehow reminded me of Helmut Lang's shows in a very ungenuine way. Unfortunately, Lee will never reach those highs. He's too limited as a designer and he's simply too pretentious.

When it comes to the clothes, it was the least confident collection of Daniel Lee. It was Jacquemus-lite, just with more experimental pieces and with slightly better quality. At this point I don't even want to see his "ironic" silhouettes because they don't make any sense anymore. It was cool back in 2020 when he had those campaigns with golden cars and yachts, but now it's out of place. The menswear as a whole was also a miss to me because it was too oversized. The choice of fabrics was also questionable.

After seeing this show, I don't even know where they want to go on from there. It was a confusing collection full of nothing. Even the accessories were just there, they didn't leave any impression.

 

[reese06]

Everything has pretty much all been said. The clothing isn't bad per se but to echo everyone else, they are souless.

The pretentiousness of it all brought to mind the times where boutiques were all the rage with cold, mean sales associates. It actually made me think of the Jeffrey skits from Saturday Night Live. Which is ironic because the Jeffrey boutique in NYC also lost its cool factor.

 

[Urban Stylin]

I dont mind the street vibe even in the menswear but wasnt feeling those towel pieces and the rain boots at all. My favourite section were the ink blue pieces.
I like the idea of having the show in Detroit which has obviously seen its own share of problems including crime and poverty but also happens to be way more than that despite the fact that the media only chooses to focus on one side yet many of the other fashion capitals do have a major crime/seedy side that we never see. It is an important industrial city as well as a cultural icon. Bringing high fashion to the city helps to bring another side to the forefront. It's not so different from Baltimore which is mostly covered as this poverty, drug infested and crime ridden hoodlum yet those of us that have lived near Baltimore know that there's alot more to it than that including its own fashion week.

 

[Nomar]

I honestly don’t know what’s worse here, the abysmal casting or the terrible fits. He’s trying to do some Demna-esque silhouettes and it just looks bad.