Nicholas Kirkwood...summer shoes!

Kirkwood: the name of the best shoes-designer of this period (this is my opinion...at least.). I love him because he purposes every seasons something new but he maintains his style, too. For example we can always find the "asymmetric-platform" which characterized all his shoes and that became a trend of the last seasons and it is going on.
So, when I saw these amazing shoes on LuisaViaRoma website I have to show you these art pieces. All of them are made with karung and leather or suede, the heels are: 3,5 the first and 13 cm the other two. I find interesting the platform that is smaller than the other season, the colors (soft and almost ethereal) and the line that drive the eyes on the shoes. In fact, are just the lines that give an amazing sensation of lightness which everyone, or at least I, love.




Images and shop on-line:
LuisaViaRoma


Gaultier and Givenchy... couture s/s 2011

Gaultier repurposed his classic dresses and prints/colors/materials that made him famous. We see a sparkling collection, with a lot of important dresses that are so voluminous  and colored that is impossible not to like them. Their sophisticate appearance and the wonderful ruffle of them make the Gaultier show one of the most particular and interesting show of high fashion paris fashion week.
Riccardo Tisci use feathers and transparences like only he can do. Here the main theme of the last couture collection is developed with a great Japanes influence and a wonderful work about volumes. Givenchy is the essence of gothic-white style. Tisci tries to add volumes, working on the back of the dresses, and the result are very elegant...I find! The most beautiful thing is the minimalism of the tops and the exageration on the skirts...also interesting are the simple lines and cuts that help the elgant and sometimes androginous appearance of the dresses. In the end, a touch of yellow and red make these dresses absolutely young.









 
Summary of other high-fashion shows:

Alexandre Vauthier: Like the other times the shapes and the strong-shoulders are amazing but there's not any innovation: the evening dresses are so classic and some colors are absolutely ugly.
Alexis Mabille: I find it's wonderful the idea to purpose every outfit in a evening version and in a "day" one: the opposition between day and night, always cool!
Chanel: The most boring Lagerfeld collection, please those dresses don't have any link with couture!
Elie Saab: Romantic and etereal dresses, Saab showed a gorgeus collection where every dress was unique and the volumes (obtained only with embroidery) are very chic.
Armani Privè: Giorgio Armani is the most innovative designer in this couture week. His materials are completely new, the light of them and of their colors left me speechless. I don't speak of this collection only because I think that is very complicate (especially for shapes and volumes) that need a specific review wrote by a fashion journalist...so go on Vogue (or other magazines websites...) and check out the show. 
Stéphane Rolland: I believe that this designer has really understood the sense of couture, he presented amazing shapes and volumes with very scenografic and full of drama dresses.
Valentino: I expected something more by Valentino, Maria Grazia Chiuri and Pier Paolo Piccioli designed a too much "ethereal" and transparent collection. Also in this case the couture is almost disappeared apart from some very ancient clothes, but the real problem is that too much times Valentino (with those two designers) purposes the same evening dresses...boring!

Shows (and pics via):
Vogue (JPG)
Vogue (Givenchy)


Jan Taminiau...couturier or crazy designer?

Jan Taminiau born in Netherland in the 1975 and he worked near a lot of important designer, in particular close Oliver Theyskens. we could see a lot of Theyskens influences in his collections. I knew it with this very particular pic of Lady Gaga who wore a creation of him. So, I decided to take more information about his past collection. I discovered (at least for me that I didn't know him) a new designer which owns a very personal style that is a mix of gothic, elegant, chic and "classic couture" style: the result? Ethereal women that have a big knowledge of themselves. But, as all the best designers, he is also very eclectic... In fact he presented collections full of historical referrements (the empire one....is gorgeus!) or volumes. In the "check, check, mate!" collection we can see an evolution of the british style (I'm thinking ot Vivienne Westwood clothes) that is going to the couture world. I love his high-fashion approach and his desire to overtake the classical borders of couture.
In the end, you can see first of all Lady Gaga, then his shows: some of them are r-t-w ones and some of them couture ones... I suggest you to watch all the shows on his website.







Images and officiale website:
[Lady Gaga] Red Carpet Fashion Awards
Jan Taminiau


Dior and Margiela...couture s/s 2011

On monday Dior, Margiela, Armani, Mabille and so on, presented their high fashion shows. Then, yesterday Chanel and Givenchy showed their collections and today the week is closed by Gaultier and Valentino.
But, all these things don't matter with the post. I'd like to speak about Dior and Margiela, today, and then of the other designers.
I start with Dior that is my absolutely favourite brand and show in haute couture week. Galliano is fresh, creative and genious and all these adjectives are not only words but reality. However, you remind the f/w 2010 show of Dior couture that was defined by fresh and spring colors that were more suitable to that season than to winter. Now we see a show for the following spring that is more suitable for the winter than for the spring, so  is Galliano crazy or could we understand it if we watch to  it by a different point of view? I believer that EVOLUTION is the key word to understand all the fashion world...So, if we consider the colors like provocation, like a desire to aovid the clichè and we consdier the shapes (more squared like the f/w 2010 Armani show, more soft and less "exagerate" in the classic meaning of the word like the last Galliano's couture shows, more conceptual and less sexy...) we will understand that Galliano is trying to evolve his vision of couture to reach a new level where the sex appeal and the "past details, past luxe" (that are everytime present in his collections) are replaced by a conceptual and more consciou knowledge of fashion. In the end, and in easier words it's clear that couture is something that must be admired and left speechless and doesn't need all these words that I spent...So, enjoy it without think too much.
About Margiela, I have to say that I love this maison and so my judgements could be a bit subjective and not really objective. By the way, when someone say "Margiela couture" everyone thinks to a stupid, useless and completely unwearable couture...it's so right! But also here the things are changed, developed, evolved. In the s/s 2011, Margiela showed cardboard shapes dresses and here the masion developed the concept in a more wearable way. Here I can see something more similar to beauty than only to "simple0 creativity and conceptuality", here Margiela arrived to a kind of couture that is   (even if it will be worn only by "fashion addicted" and "Margiela lovers"...) more wearable than normal. Maybe it's the absence of Martin Margiela, its team chose a more "commercial" way to make clothes (in this case with commercial I mean wearable...). So, to end the post, I love this collection (it's the first time I really love a Margiela high fashion collection). But the most beautiful things are, for me, the  transparence coat (last pic), [the first interesting result of this kind of coat], and the squared dresses (the right one in particular) where the "intrecciato lavoration" and the shapes are amazingly gathered with a nice result...this is the real minimalism but also the "Prada's maximalism"! 









Images:
Vogue


Best men looks...Milan and Paris!

No words, only images of my favourite outfits for the following fall/winter:



Mugler and McQueen


Van Noten and Watanabe


Burberry and Gucci


Prada and Yamamoto
      

Etro and Moncler



Givenchy and Comme des Garçons


Dior and Kenzo 


Bottega Veneta and Lanvin



Browne and Simons



Lanvin and Givenchy



Dior and Hermès


Images:
Vogue


Balmain...pin top!

The t-shirts of Balmain are somethign "legendary" in the last two season and legendary are their prices too. 
The green shirt with some holes of the past season that you saw on a lot of stars, surely, was a boring shirt that, for me, was not chic, glamourous or cool...simply a used shirt.  Instead, this model that is embellished with safety pins (that are one of the most trendy object since the Versace dress worn by Liz Hurley...) is so beautiful. The appearance is not too much used or destroyed but it's almost chic. In particular, the most important thing is that this shirt represent the style and the "fashion idea" of the Decarnin's design: this is the DNA of Balmain (since Decarnin have started to design for this maison). 
But now...speak about the price. This is sold for 1300 euros and the green one for 1000 euros. Ok, the price are completely crazy even if I understand more the 1300 euros for this mdoel than 1000 for the past one. But the question is: Balmain should earn a lot of money to establish its economical position (NYMAG said this on Balmain profile page) but are 5 years that Decarnin is at Balmain, so hasn't Balmain yet solved its economical troubles? 
In the end, I think  (and Anna dello Russo thinks so) that Balmain is the most stylish brand of our epoque and that its creations are the best representation and mix of shabby-chic, elegance and luxe; but the prices are too much expensive and they are not justified by anything...This is the main reason because this shirt will have a lot of success with celebs but nothing in "real life", also in the upper class society.




Images and shop on-line:
Net-a-Porter


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