Louis Vuitton Catwalk Fashion Show Paris FW2010

The circle is round. What started with the 50’s/60’s inspired show at Prada two weeks ago ended yesterday with a Louis Vuitton-collection in a production that breathed the Fifties-sixties in every outfit. The collection was inspired by And God created women, the movie that made Brigitte Bardot a big star, and the models looked sensual, feminine and curvy.

Marc Jacobs explained his take on the Fifties as an excuse to to pause and appreciate what a house like Vuitton is capable of creating. And that are bags actually, so there was a beautiful bag for every oufit Jacobs sent out – like fantastic redos of the Vuitton Speedy.

The silhouette was curvy with focus at the waist, full skirted dresses or full skirts mixed with tailored jackets- that’s probably why Jacobs hired Laetitia Casta, Bar Refaeli, Catherine McNeil, Karolina Kurkova, and finally Elle Macpherson, all women who were banned from the fashion-shows for a long time because of their beautiful, curvy body.  Jacobs made them look  fresh, feminine and ingenue, with hair scraped back into high, bouncy ponytails; clean makeup; and square-toed, block-heeled pumps trimmed with flat bows.

Hermès Catwalk Fashion Show Paris FW2010

It looked as if Jean Paul Gaultier wanted to stress the origins of the Hermès fashionlabel. There was leather everywhere in the collection, which was inspired by the British 60’s television serie The Avengers.

A not-too-great-looking Lily Cole opened the show in a black leather pantsuit, zipped on the front. The rest of her outfit was made from leather as well: shoes, belt, gloves, bag. Even her bowler hat and umbrella could easily have had some leather parts.

Some crocodile leather followed, on a skirt, a belt, a pair of trousers and a jacket. After that, the leather designs became so thick they seemed more appropriate for men. Especially when the (leather!) ties and the extra-wide pants came by, the show got a very masculine feeling.

Fortunately shades of light gray, camel and brown softened the looks. Just when one of the models came on carrying a New York Times under her arm (slightly pushing Suzy Menkes, who works for the newspaper, to write a good review on the show).

Most of the woolen coats that followed, had leather collars in a different shade. A beige toggle coat popped up out of nowhere, shoulders were accentuated by leather parts and a long leopard printed skirt was seen from under a stiff leather jacket. And though we were happy most labels temporarily said goodbye to this specific animal print it later came by on several dresses, a coat, a blouse and even on one of the two hoop skirts.

There was so much animal material in this collection any PETA activist would have gone mad watching this show. Even we could hardly handle the amount of leather JPG sent off on the runway. Yet we did get very inspired on how many ways there are to wear it.

Louis Vuitton Catwalk Fashion Show Paris FW2010

Valentino Catwalk Fashion Show Paris FW2010

For fall Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pier Paolo Piccioli got in a very feminine Valeninto mood. Their designs had frills and ruffles from the beginnening till the end of the show and were made out of the most delicate fabrics.

While videos of waterfalls were played on huge screens all over the show area the models worked the runway. The clothes they wore, were embellished with ruffles and floral appliqués. On most designs this looked great, but on a short black leather jacket, worn by Mirte Maas, it felt like ruffle-overkill.

This Valentino collection had a very romantic and classic vibe, still Chiuri and Picciolo succeeded in letting it feel more youthful than before. The fur coats, lace blouses, silk dresses and airy chiffon tops looked smooth. The shades of nude, beige, white and black worked really well with the Valentino red we saw on four dresses and a skirt. Golden studded kitten heels were the perfect detail on every outfit.

Five long evening gowns were the ending of the show. The last one in transparent Valentino red looked stunning. Yet a black lace gown with a butterfly on the right shoulder, worn by Patricia van der Vliet, was even more breath-taking.

Chloe Catwalk Fashion Show Paris FW2010

Well, camel is the new black for next fall. And clean, sporty minimalism is the trend.

The collection Chloe’s Hannah MacGibbon sent out yesterday had it all. Her collection mixed the all classic American sportswear with a Seventies touch. It looked sleek and sensual – especially the wide legged trousers with high waist – everything was cut loosely to the body, there were great, big coats, sweater-like cashmere T-shirts and elegant blouses with draped bow details.

The only that we missed was, ehm, color. Besides 80 % camel, brown and black were the only ‘colors’ in the collection. That made it look a bit dull and tame, while camel is a great color to mix with some vibrant orange, electric blue or mean green. We would have been happy with a pair of gloves, a belt, a necklace or even a lipstick showing the sunny side.

Streetfashion Paris FW2010 Day 7

What are you wearing during the coming fashionweeks? Your Givenchy-heels, your latest Celine-coat or that vintage Chanel? Maybe we’ll spot you in Paris, Milan, New York or Amsterdam. During the fashionweeks we refresh our streetwear posts regularly. We don’t judge, we’re not the fashion-police, we just enjoy fashion and your own personal style. Next stop: Paris.

Streetfashion Paris FW2010 Day 6

What are you wearing during the coming fashionweeks? Your Givenchy-heels, your latest Celine-coat or that vintage Chanel? Maybe we’ll spot you in Paris, Milan, New York or Amsterdam. During the fashionweeks we refresh our streetwear posts regularly. We don’t judge, we’re not the fashion-police, we just enjoy fashion and your own personal style. Next stop: Paris.

Chanel Catwalk Fashion Show Paris FW2010

Global cooling, not global warming was the inspiration for Chanel’s fall/winter collection. Now don’t think the show was about durable fashion or had something to do with eco-friendly production. No, on the contrary Karl Lagerfeld even flew in an iceberg from Sweden to decorate his catwalk. After the fashion show that iceberg was to be flewn back to Sweden as well. If you ask us, this kind of superfluous actions only increase global warming.

During the show the iceberg was slowly melting, so all models ended up walking in big puddles of water. What a pity for the luxurious clothes! Karl’s long pants, floor-sweeping coats & dresses and his fur boots all got wet.

His fake fur boots, we must say. Cause the whole iceberg-thing might not have been so politically correct, Karl did use fake fur for this collection. He commented: ‘You cannot fake chic but you can be chic in fake fur’ and explained that fake fur, nowadays, looks very realistic. Because you can hardly see the difference between real and fake fur Karl decided this collection was to be a ‘triumph for fake fur’. The fur came in brown, gray, white and black and was seen on the skirts, boots, pants, cuffs, coats, bags and collars.

Other fabrics were leather and the typical Chanel tweed. Tweed was, of course, used for some of the short jackets, but we saw it on some coats, pants and skirts too. The skirts were rather short, compared to, for example those of Marc Jacobs. They ended halfway the upper leg. The collars of almost all designs were high, as were the waisted pants.

Apart from a little bit of red Karl didn’t use any colors. The show ended with the last models all wearing white designs. Even the necklaces and the large rings were white (they were metallic during the first part of the show). It all looked stunning with the real, white iceberg in the background. Yet we think an iceberg from papier-mache would have been just as nice.

Yves St. Laurent Catwalk Fashion Show Paris FW2010

The Yves St. Laurent-show started promising with a variation on the Little Black Dress with cape and a black three piece suit. Such a clean and classic look would be just on trend, as more houses are aiming at the new sporty minimalism. And no other house has a history in tailored sportswear and classic Parisian sensibility as the house of Yves St. Laurent.

But somehow designer Stefano Pilati tried too hard to be classic and modern, it needs a creative talent to make conservative sporty chic look dynamic and not dated. The long skirts however looked dull, the white shirts were dowdy and the plastic capes and eveningwear sexless. It looked like the collection was made for a nun instead of a woman of the world. Also because of the caped black forms, the head-coverings, the white cotton and heavy chain pendants.

Stefano Pilati told reporters that the collection was all about protection and that is was partly an homage to YSL and the tailleur. Maybe he should take a look at the retrospective on YSL that soon will open in the Petit Palais in Paris – there’s still a lot to learn from the old master.

Kenzo Catwalk Fashion Show FW2010

Kenzo’s invitation was a vacuum plastic ‘bag’ with different sorts of dead leaves in it. Kenzo’s catwalk was decorated with what looked like dead palm trees. Let’s just say Antonio Marras wanted to make clear he was showing his fall collection for the brand.

Bourgeois and bohemian styles came together in this seventies inspired collection. Long, wide, dresses were made out of multiple fabrics. Marras chose the most beautiful floral and graphic prints and let those prints come together in his patchwork designs. The autumn colors (light brown/terracotta, light green, yellow and faded pink) he had picked, looked lovely.

Not only different prints were mixed and matched, diverse fabrics were seen in one look as well. Airy floral dresses were combined with fur and sequined waistcoats. Next to the floral dresses we saw checked versions decorated with bibs of feather creations. They were followed by a few darker, striped designs.

The felt hats looked great. Together with the printed scarves, sunglasses and wegde-soled boots they were the perfect accessories for this boho collection.

We read Marras mixed the styles of iconic women like Maria Schneider, Tina Chow and Farrah Fawcett for this collection. But we’ve never spotted these women in such outstanding designs before. And although we liked the show, it wasn’t something we’d never seen before at Kenzo.

Next Page »