Designers literally cut back as models appear in slashed prom dresses and puffy bum covers
The City of Light lived up to its reputation as the fashion capital where creativity and daring reign supreme over the bottom line, with innovative Dutch duo Viktor & Rolf delivering a collection of carved-up tulle prom gowns, while Jean Paul Gaultier offered up puffy bum covers and a convex, pregnant lady bustier.
Not the world's most marketable spring-summer 2010 collections, perhaps, but leave that to Milan. In Paris, we have ideas. And Naomi.
In one of the highlights of the French capital's collections thus far, supermodel Naomi Campbell strutted her stuff at Russian label Chapurin, wearing only a translucent bustier and a strategically placed swathe of silk. Not only did the 39-year-old hold her own with the other models - most of them less than half her age - she slayed them.
At Viktor & Rolf, it was the clothing that got slayed: Perfect Barbie princess gowns in tulle were carved like topiary into much more interesting shapes.
Gaultier was up to his old tricks, serving up a collection of hip-hop-inspired lingerie streetwear that included oversized overalls with a built-in cone bra.
Jean Paul Gautier
Gaultier mixed his trademark lingerie-as-outerwear look with hip-hop inspired streetwear, layering powder pink bras, garters, bustiers and padded and pointy prostheses of all ilk under and over extra-wide jeans, funky overalls and military coats.
Cone-shaped bras were built into a pair of oversized overalls, the straps crisscrossing in the back to form Gaultier's signature X, while the tails of an oversized sports coat were cut away to reveal a pair of round bottom-covers.
One model even wore a bustier in chocolate brown with a massive convex pregnant belly cover. "Instead of filling oneself with silicone or collagen, why not try these prostheses, which can be taken off," said Gaultier. "It's perfect!"
French fashion's one-time enfant terrible described the collection as a "return to the source".
"I wanted to get away from the increasing bourgeois understanding of fashion. When I started there was a real desire to be individualistic and to mark our difference from one another."
Though there was nothing earth-shatteringly innovating about the collection - Gaultier has been incorporating street fashion and foundations into his collection since the start of his career more than 30 years ago - the show still radiated energy, excitement and an endless sense of possibility.
In a welcome change from many of Paris' blond-haired, blue-eyed catwalks, Gaultier's models were of all different ethnic origins, their brown, black, blond and red hair pulled into playful side pigtails. Many of them sported fake tattoos reading "Jean Paul" in Gothic lettering across their necks or down their arms, which were piled high with stacks of Rajasthani-inspired bangles.
Sophia Kokosalaki
Greek designer Kokosalaki served up a spring-summer 2010 ready-to-wear collection of artfully draped cocktail dresses that would have done her ancestors proud.
Abbreviated cocktail dresses in neutral tones were wound in whisper-light chiffon so graceful it evoked classical Greek sculptures.
"I did all my drapery in wet fabrics, just to keep it really light and effortless," the imposing blonde said.
The abbreviated, asymmetrical dresses in black, ivory and purple-y gray fluttered invitingly as the models tromped down the catwalk. Still, the dresses were not so different from the short, draped bustier and sheath cocktail numbers that have already dominated many other Paris runways.
What set Kokosalaki apart were the little leather jackets and short jumpsuits embellished with traditional Greek motifs.
"My heritage is so rich, it's a never-ending source of inspiration," she said, adding with a laugh. "It's a bit of a joke, but Greek people like to say that all the designs, all the motifs out there, their origin is Greek."
Viktor & Rolf
It was like a high school prom gone awry. The full, ankle-length skirt of a would-be prom queen gown was riddled with Swiss cheese holes that cut clear through the bubble-gum pink tulle. Another, in mint green tulle, had a horizontal section at the hip sliced out with almost surgical precision.
"There's a certain aggression to it, to the act of cutting, and we like that because that way it becomes contemporary," the lookalike pair said. "We didn't just want to create plain ball gowns."
They added that they'd taken the recession-era idea of "cutting back" literally. And like the good Dutchmen they are, they didn't waste the leftovers, but instead recycled them.
They applied the dense cuttings of tulle to bustier cocktail dresses and satin nighties, sticking the thick bristles onto the most unexpected places. A sheath dress sprouted a thicket of tulle from the neckline and shoulders. A little black dress had a whole hemisphere of yellow tulle growing out of the back, like the bristles of a hedgehog. Another was bisected diagonally by what would normally be the hemline of a ball gown.
Asked how many kilometres of tulle had gone into their spring-summer 2010 ready-to-wear collection, the two replied, "Many, many, many, many, many."
