Maria Grazia Chiuri, as many of us are after the past couple years, is focused on “being present”, a theme that manifests in how this season’s couture collection explores textile research in a series of pieces through the language of subtle embroidery. The opening look is something we’d imagine as a safe place to explore our present from, being enveloped in the perfect long coat and cap ensemble that would blend into a horizon of birch trees as much as it stands out in setting the stage for an unexpected yet calm unfolding of sartorial tailoring into the dreamy, nymph-like dresses we know and love.
“Couture stirs unexpected desires and reveals the existence of what we did know. Isn’t that the role of the avant-garde?…”
The backdrop to the show, Chambre de Soie by French artist Eva Jospin echoed theme in life-sized embroideries recalling the Indian-inspired Salle aux Broderies in the Colonna Palace in Rome, the tapestries seemingly unraveled and given space to redefine themselves as living things while models strut the runway in their reimagined forms.
“…To define, through artistic practice, the longings of a world int he midst of profound transformation.”
At the interaction of style, movement and attitude, warp and weft construction techniques play out in checks, tweeds, texture and dimensional black and white throughout the collection, present still in the cool stone blues and blushes of autumn and winter. Of course, Chiruri brings us back from our exploration, into the embodiment of the Dior bride, her gown undulating the colors of the backdrop, and hinting at the Spring to come.
