Signé Chanel

I love YouTube. It contains so many fashion pearls. Like this documentary, for example. "Signé Chanel" follows the world of a Chanel couture collection. It goes deep, from Karl's sketches, to fittings, to all the tailors actually making the dresses (an extremely hard work, that we forget sometimes), to catwalk design and the staging of the show. A must see for any couture fan. Enjoy it!

 

"Tout ici rayonne, tout fleurit, tout chante"

"Everything in here shines, blossoms, sings". With these words Victor Hugo described Antibes, the setting of Chanel Cruise 2012 collection. So what better colour than yellow to start this show? The first dresses are all made in yellow tweed. Longuette skirts and  slim-waisted jackets are predominant. Yellow then converts into wisteria and then again in a cream like colour.

Then you get a little twist on the roaring twenties, with high waisted flowing pants, ruffled blouses and straw-boaters hat. And of course, being it a Cruise collection, swimwear. Which, by the way, I don' t think Chanel recommends for swimming; it' s more of a poolside chic look, one piece black swimsuits, worn with beige tweed jackets or smooth bi-coloured (b&w, of course) capes. And jewellery. Possibly diamond camelia brooches and pearls sautoirs, which adorned heavily this collection.

 

A variation on black and white. Swimsuits turn into dresses, symmetrically "fought" by those two colours. Piet mondrian vibes all over them.

 Then black dresses covers themselves with coloured triangles, almost like a mosaic or a Depero painting. Delicate flowers blossoms on white dresses, then white and black again steal the scene. Long, red carpet looks, just in time for Cannes film festival. Very graphic dresses and soft, feminine floor lenght ones. The fabric (silk, tulle) flows even with tight skirts.
Karl Lagerfeld, as usual, never disappoints.

all images courtesy of Vogue.it

The grand Couture

all images courtesy of Vogue.it

Kristen McMenamy. Photos by Patrizio Roversi. What can I say? The pictures are hauntingly beautiful. Kristen is like a spirit in a french-like 18th century aristocracy mansion. Everything is falling apart. The clothes give her a ghostly aura but their opulence in undeniable. Sublime Couture.

V is for Visionaire

Visionaire is like magazine couture. Why? Well, first of all it costs a lot. And when I say "a lot" I mean it.
But that's only the venial aspect.
It is like couture because it involves major artists and designers, and every issue is a little masterpiece, an artistic manifesto. The first issue came out in Spring 1991. Called "Spring" is an effort inspired in part by Irving Penn's book of flowers. Released unbinded (they couldn't afford binding), a copy reached fashion designer Isaac Mizrahi who sent them a note saying, ''Congratulations, you're doing a Flair for the '90s!''.

From then on, it only got better. Famous fashion designers and photographers contribute to its issues, which come out 3-4 times per year. They experiment with contents and with packaging: the current issue called "Religion", for example, comes in a box made with wood from. The artistic direction? Riccardo Tisci from Givenchy. The inspiration? An exploration of religion. There's plenty of references to funeral processions, baroque churches and religious old master sculpture and painting.

The current issue leather cover

One of the photos from Visionaire 60: Religion. Carine Roitfeld photographed by Karl Lagerfeld

Visionaire 60: Lea T by Giovanna Battaglia & Pierpaolo Ferrari

Visionaire 60: Christina Ricci by Daniele & Iango portrayed as a Spanish Madonna

For further informations visit Visionaire 

Catwalk

Look at what I' ve found!!! An early '90 documentary movie following the life of Christy Turlington during 1994 spring week in Milan, Paris and London. The great thing about this documentary is that we get to see all the major designers and models, know them a little bit better. Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss, in my opinion, steal Christy's scene. They are amazing. And what about Carla Bruni? She seems soo funny, far away from the icy french première dame of today. Better times than today? I don' t know. But one fact is for sure: they all seemed to have the greatest fun.

Inspiration|Dior

Pushkin museum, Moscow. From April, 28th to July, 7th.
This is a hard one to miss, so if you will be in Moscow make sure you visit this exhibition. Many historical pieces designed by Monsieur Dior himself and also the ones by John Galliano, pieces that deserve to be considered as art masterpieces.
To reflect this, the dresses are displayed with paintings by Matisse, Quinn, Picasso, Boldrini just to name a few. The viewers are able to see the influence of those painters throughout Dior history.
Lest we forget, Dior opened in 1928 an art gallery in Paris, displaying the likes of Klee, Giacometti, Picasso.
For further information, visit : http://www.diorcouture.com/pouchkine/uk/#/home

All images courtesy of Diorcouture.com

Epitomizing contrasts

I' d really like to go to NY Met right now. Why?? Because it' s where "Savage Beauty" is taking place. It's an exhibition about the great body of work that the late Alexander McQueen has left as his heritage.
It is quite an interesting exhibition, showing how deep the reflection behind his work was and the great researches he made. That's clearly an insight of a genius' mind.
I'd suggest you to take a break from whatever you' re doing and take some time to check the Met website, to discover more about this exhibition. I was quite shocked at first, because you really get to see a great portion of this event. So without any further unuseful commentation from my part, here's the website:  http://blog.metmuseum.org/alexandermcqueen/

Check out this video introduction made by Andrew Bolton, the curator of the exhibition.

The cabinet of curiosities

The Romantic Nationalism room

The Romantic Exoticism room

The Romantic Primitivism room

The Romantic Naturalism room  -all images courtesy of metmuseum.org-