Mood board: Mining the streets of the Eastern Bloc, the French collective’s Georgian head designer Demna Gvasalia (formally of Louis Vuitton and Maison Margiela, and a graduate of Antwerp’s Royal Academy) presented a line-up of khaki storm trooper coats, high-waisted acid wash denim and parachute trenches. Everything was oversized by a country mile, from motorcross leather bikers to stretched mohair knits, corduroy tailoring and shearlings, all of which were left raw to drag along the floor.
Best in show: It was the collection’s extreme volumes that made these archetypes interesting, coupled with the unique ways that Gvasalia cut them. Floral tea dresses were sliced in half up the back and inserted with t-shirt jersey; puffers were cut away from the shoulders and subsequently curved out, rather than in at the hem; while most sleeves were at least 30 centimetres too long.
Scene setting: Few would liken the basement of Le Depot, the gay Parisian sex club to a fashion show space, but Vetements is not concerned with maintaining the status quo. Red up and down lights, hose-able concrete floors, wash-and-wear wall tiling and diner-style barstool seating set the spatial story. However, paired up with the show’s casting of ‘models’ scouted from the streets of Paris, London and Russia, you could say the whole experience worked.
Photography: Jason Lloyd-Evans
