Take Away In YSL

Do you need to dabao in such a fancy box?

There are things we use in our daily lives that we do not give much thought to, but designers do. In the area of luxury bags, anything that can hold anything can be basis for a new bag. Balenciaga started the madness in 2017 when they made an all-leather version of the Ikea shopper Frakta, down to the same bright shade of blue. And then things turn downright absurd last year when Louis Vuitton released those tub-like bags in the likeness of paint cans. And, even more ridiculous, was the Lay’s-chip-bag-lookalike, again by Balenciaga. Now, Saint Laurent joins the who-can-pick-the-most-ordinary-of-things-and-make-a-bag-out-of-it mania; they created a take-away box in calfskin—printed with the maison’s Cassandre monogram) and affixed with a gold logo on the front—and slap a four-figure asking price on it.

Buying anything in a restaurant or food court to bring home won’t necessarily reward you with a box akin to this, not even in cardboard. Plastic is the operative word. A cake might be placed in a similar box for you to carry, but you’d probably have to spend a three-figure sum to get it. So, in the end, this fancy dabaohe (打包盒) might just be the bag to hold your humble lunch when you decide to take the food—chai png (菜饭), maybe?—away. We’re not sure if the suede lining would keep the meal warm, but we are quite certain you do not want the greasy base of the styrofoam box to mess up the beautiful interior, which comes with a small pocket that would be handy for the receipt that you might later wish to share online because the stall overcharged you for the fried fish. Interestingly, this box is marketed as a men’s bag. So, chances are, you’ll be be carrying your Nintendo Switch in it.

Saint Laurent Take-Away Box, SGD2,660, is available in Saint Laurent stores. Photo: Saint Laurent

En Présence De La Tour Eiffel

Posted by Style On The Dot

The pieces in Saint Laurent’s latest collection seem to mimic the leanness of Paris’s famous tower, but, perhaps, far sexier

How many variations of a lean, body-skimming silk-jersey dress can one squeeze into a collection without the garment looking repetitive? We counted about 38 of them out of the 49 looks that Anthony Vaccarello showed for Saint Laurent’s spring/summer 2023. And can hoodies be anything other than what they have been? We counted them, too, and there are 24, worn over the head in more ways than one. Some of the looks remind us of what Grace Jones wore as May Day in the one of the James Bond franchises, 1985’s A View to a Kill (in which Roger Moore was licensed to kill for the last time), interestingly partially shot in Paris. Her costumes were designed by the late Azzedine Alaïa. One particular burgundy hooded dress in the Saint Laurent collection is truly evocative of a purple one Ms Jones wore, which stood out like the Eiffel Tower against James Bond’s real love target, Tanya Roberts as Stacey Sutton, in hyper-feminine clothes that Virginie Viard would love. Perhaps, most unusual of all was the hood; it had never appeared on a Bond girl until then.

It is, however, unlikely that Mr Vaccarello was inspired by a fictional M16 secret agent’s nemesis-turn-one-night-stand, even if double-O-seven’s romantic interests are mostly clad in the styles of the day. The hoodie-dresses have a different lineage, one that can be traced to Yves Saint Laurent himself, when he introduced the capuche (literally hood in French) dresses in 1969, four years after the more famous and remembered Mondrian dresses were shown. Mr Vaccarello has, naturally, taken the ’60s out of the capuche and given it his own ’80s touch with what could be a ’30s slenderness and swish, and present-day sinew. Compellingly, the hoods are fashioned in different forms, many emerging from the bust, some criss-crossing the bodice, some draping one shoulder and extending to become a sleeve. These are, as redundant as the pointing out might be, not your garden-variety street-style hoods.

In this collection, Mr Vaccarello seems to want to reduce it to perhaps the essential, even if that risks sounding banal in this near-the-end-of-the-pandemic world. You get the slim maxi-dresses, the hoodie versions, the leather jacket and coats (some with pronounced shoulders, some not), a few blouses with pussy bows (by now a house standard), and relaxes trousers. And not a single bead, paillette, or embroidery, and yet even the jersey dresses look sleek and glamourous. The relatively small offering in terms of looks could suggest a preference for uniform dressing, perhaps; but not quite such as those adopted by folks of Silicon Valley, certainly not Elizabeth Holmes. Not for Mr Vaccarello a take on the turtleneck! Interpretive flair points to looking at the house archives and adapting judiciously, especially the colours. These are more muted than what YSL was known for, but no less seductive. Reportedly, Mr Vaccarello selected them from old Polaroids of the fittings of the past; hence, the lack of punch, but not without depth, and for those who require not the brightness of flourescent pigments in some modem dye jobs.

The restraint—chromatic and stylistic—in the collection seems to suggest a toning down, even if just for now. Perhaps this is the proverbial palate cleanser. There is, you could see, not even a single short skirt (what would Zoe Kravitz wear?! Or Blackpink’s Rosé?). Even the occasional torso-baring is overwhelmed by powerful coats, their shoulders accentuated, their hems grazing the floor. When we look at the models, walking daintily, as if they are confined in hobble skirts, as they pass the lit Eiffel Tower in the background, we wonder if the darkened figures could be the silhouette of the capital’s most famous tower, seen upside down! The favourite symbol of the city isn’t co-starring in a Saint Laurent show for the first time. Still, each continue to embody the spirit of Paris with certainty and, yes, undiminished élan.

Screen shot (top): saintlaurent.com. Photos: gorunway.com

To You, Paris

Posted by Style On The Dot

Saint Laurent’s love of its home city is again illustrated, as it stages the spring/summer 2022 show under the golden brilliance of the Eiffel Tower

What’s more French than the Eiffel Tower? Or the maison Yves Saint Laurent built? The evening presentation of the house’s spring/summer 2022 collection is in the presence of the 132-year-old tour Eiffel, which reopened in July after being shut for nearly nine months as France dealt with the second wave of the COVID-19 pandemic. If there is anything that could signal a return to some semblance of normalcy, it is perhaps the towering grandeur of the symbol of Paris. The models walked in the open space, extending Anthony Vaccarello’s connection with the outdoors of the past two seasons, only now in the heart of the city and the home of some of the most recognisable brands in the world, especially those founded here, on which the identity of the brands hinge on. None more so than Saint Laurent, whose founder loves Paris so much, he named a perfume after her. But did the house not say they were opting out of the PFW calendar some two seasons back, even ‘showing’ away from Paris? So what could this presentation, right before the most symbolic of Parisian monuments, mean? Change of mind?

The inspiration this season, however, is not the city per se. Reportedly, Mr Vaccarello was particularly impressed by Paloma Picasso, the French/Spanish daughter of the artist Pablo Picasso. In the inner circle of Yves Saint Laurent, Ms Picasso is considered an important figure although much of the accolades went to Betty Catroux and Loulou de la Falaise (deceased). If Ms Catroux was the tomboy and Ms a la Falaise the dandy, Ms Picasso was the femme fatale, completing the trinity of women who surround the man. When he first met Ms Picasso, he was said to have called out in delight: “It’s Dora Maar!”—the photographer/artist who was the lover and muse of Pablo Picasso (it is not known how the daughter felt when compared to a woman not her mother!). Ms Picasso would take a different path from the other two women: she went on to be a jewellery designer, whose name, like another European Elsa Peretti, is very much linked to Tiffany, now owned by LVMH. And also unlike the duo, she was never thought to be quite the designer’s muse, until now when Mr Vaccarello brings up her name. Is a muse still crucial to a house? Or, is that so many decades ago? In an inclusive society that we are supposed to be in, is singling one woman, even if she’s of international repute, to represent women in general advantageous to a brand?

Whether the inspiration came from a single city or a one woman, Mr Vaccarello is in what may be considered his finest form. Doing away the tiniest of skirts or profusion of marabou, he (re)engineered the chic that is so synonymous with YSL, and gives it a keen street posturing that recalls one Left Bank of the ’70s than the equivalent of today elsewhere. The masculine tailoring, for one, stood dependably tall as the tour Eiffel. Shoulders of suit jackets are pronounced, but not overly large or dropping too much, while sleeve lengths shortened to three quarters—a sum that is consistent with today’s love of volume, but also recall the jackets of the house in the past. One particular comes quickly to our mind, the pink, boxy, one-button single-breasted that was featured in the 1985 TV commercial for the perfume Paris, in which the model and her pronounced and straight shoulder was the embodiment of unattainable French chic. Mr Vaccarello’s own take is less feminine, but they are not diminished of the sharp elegance of tailoring associated with the house, and its story of the young heart.

Another piece was striking to us too: the double bandeau-bikini, which recalls the two bows on a bustier dress from the house’s autumn/winter 1988 haute couture collection, worn by “India’s first supermodel” Kirat Young. Sure, it’s been a skin-showing season, but Mr Vaccarello is able to take what is essentially decorative element of the past and reimagine it as a garment—skimpy as it is—that is a lot less bare than those now so omnipresent and destined to be worn in large numbers soon. Sexiness is also evident in the styling (and even concurrently adopted by very young stars such as Olivia Rodigo), but somehow Mr Vaccarello is able to throw a spanner in the works, so to speak, and temper the sexual strength by doing something quite unsexy: tucking a long wallet into the front waist of pants, not quite like a person doing so with a gun because he has no holster, but like a wet-market-bound auntie, keeping her hands free so that she can bring the bags of vegetables home. Since anything can be sexy these day, perhaps that too?

Screen grab: Saint Laurent. Photos: gorunway.com

Up On The Dunes

Posted by Style On The Dot

…where it’s all barren, Anthony Vaccarello showed a collection for Saint Laurent alluringly fertile of chic

It has been a looong fashion season. Or, an unusually extended one. In the middle of December, when stores are moving holiday collections, and some are receiving the initial drop from the spring/summer 2021 season (Kolor, for example has announced, barely into the start of winter, that their spring/summer 2021 will launch in their Tokyo store on the 19th), Saint Laurent is showing the latter only now. As far as we can remember, there has never been a spring/summer RTW show in December, at least not by a French house (others are putting out the pre-fall collections). And certainly not one shown in a desert, topping Dior’s make-believe outer space, even Dakar Fashion Week, staged last weekend in a baobab forest. Fashion has always taken us places, but not quite yet to anywhere close to the desolation of dunes.

The Saint Laurent show takes place atop a sand ridge in the Sahara (presumably), perhaps vaguely alluding to Yves Saint Laurent’s own exotic North African roots (he was born in Algeria). However, the house isn’t the first to show in a desert—in 2007, Pierre Cardin showed on the desert of Whistling Sand Mountain in Gansu Province, China. Still, it’s intriguing to see how a runway show could be set up on what appears to be pristine sands, taking into account that they are loose, and likely to shift. Even the YSL logo could be, somehow, worked into the vast slipface of a dune, creating a considerably austere, but no less striking branding of the house. When the models finally appear, emerging from a peak, like Bedouins (perhaps Frank Herbet’s Fremen, too?) coming home, but well socially distanced, we realise this is no mirage: Saint Laurent is bringing its clubby clothes to the desert.

Only thing is, the collection does not seem to be designed with going to the club in mind, or for those occasions when getting dressed-up means a certain dalliance with exaggeration, such as the massiveness of shoulders or the bareness of skin. The models, not quite sure-footed, walking in high heels on the soft sand, are not dressed for a wild night, although much of what is shown may well look good in candle, or strobe light. Rather, what we saw was a relaxed sleekness that veered dangerously close to wearable. Sure, we weren’t looking out for a parade of djellabahs or thawbs, but we weren’t expecting such controlled elegance, not in the sea of sand. These are clothes that have an air of glamour about them, evocative of the ’60s and, partially, ’70s, with a lineage that seems traceable to Christine Keeler’s heyday wardrobe.

Since the setting is a desert, it may also suggest that these are clothes to take on a holiday. But they are nothing like what the women of the Sex and the City 2 film, The Sands of Time, wore: high-camp and a little too fabulous for a desert (or worse, the Real Housewives of New York: Last Call, Morocco!). Anthony Vaccarello has largely (and finally?) stepped away from the shadow of his predecessor Hedi Slimane. The aesthetic is still retro, but it projects an inviting coolness that many might not mind revisiting. The suits are as lean, but a tad loosened-up; the le smoking is edgier, the dresses are not too sheer; the marabou (of the negligee-dresses) are fluffier; the shirts are not Tom Ford-oversexed, the flounces are well-behaved, the two extremes of biker shorts and almost-panties are options for those who likes extremes, and the pussy bows… well, they remain. And there are, interestingly, prints—florals to be exact. But they brought to our mind Richard Quinn, when we were, in fact, in a Jacqueline Susann state of mind.

Photos: Saint Laurent

Staying With Small

Posted by Style On The Dot

Have handbags become empty vessels?

Saint Laurent Pyramid Box

By Mao Shan Wang

Looks like the micro bag trend isn’t coming to an end soon. I am not sure if that is swell. I suppose it’s good to know that there are some trends that last longer than the time you take to transfer the contents of your Boy Chanel (even the small) to the Jacquemus Le Petit Chiquito Mini, which, by all accounts, started the crazy for cute but useless tiny bags that would have been more functional as earrings.

The Jacquemus miniature, as you now are aware, is 5cm at its widest—that’s at least 2cm shorter than even a a stick of lip balm. Can you imagine, even the bag’s handles are smaller than the brand’s hoop earrings! When I first saw that minuscule polygon some months back, I thought, gosh, this would not even be big enough to be a xiangnang (香囊 or ancient Chinese potpourri sachet) that (Story of Yanxi Palace’s) Wei Yingluo could give to Fuca Rucheng.

For something as large as the ribbon on Hello Kitty’s head, you’d think that its popularity will soon fade since few women would have actual use for them. A friend of mine did buy one as she thought it would make “a perfect pill box”. And in case I was not convinced, she added, “just nice for two tablets of Panadol Extra”. Bag makers obviously took notice. From Hermès to Bape, brands are producing bags with diet issues for those who like them better as pendants.

Which brings me to this Saint Laurent ‘Pyramid Box’. To be certain, this bak chang-shaped bag isn’t that small, but its mass is in keeping with anything that not only is known as “petite”, but “mini” as well. I was, in fact, surprised by how capacious this sleek lambskin quadrilateral is. You probably could fit five Le Petit Chiquito Minis in it!

What might be appealing to those into the construction of bags, such as I, is the opening. The triangular front can be freed from its magnetic clasp and pulled down. Two more triangular pieces hold the sides of the flap opening so that it would not spill the bag’s content since two magnets holding a bag shut isn’t exactly the most secure. With a slender wristlet hand strap, this is the eye-catching reticule to sit above the hand (alongside a bracelet?) while you happily dance the night away; heels preferred.

Saint Laurent Pyramid Box, SGD2,070, is available in store and online. Photo: Saint Laurent

Does Red Still Matter?

Posted by Style On The Dot

CNY Red 2019 Embroidery on H&M sweatshirt

By Mao Shan Wang

Chinese New Year is red no more. Well, not with what I have been seeing. I come from a relatively big, extended family and CNY is very important—red-letter days, if you will— to us. This means that on the two measly days of public hols that we get to guo nian, I have the chance to meet many relatives at my parents’ gaily-decorated xiqi yangyang flat. Most of them I see only once a year, so with each visit, the young gets older, the older gets older, and the oldest gets a walking stick. In years of the distant past, both young and old were always careful not to call on us in sombre colours, but these days, peer into our flat, and you might think our guests have been doused in squid ink.

My parents are not particular about what colours those who visit us during the CNY season wear. My grand parents—both paternal and maternal—were. But since they are no longer around, the juniors are emancipated from what, to them, is a silly, superstitious, and selective chromatic tradition that bears no relevance to fashion’s unceasing love for the deeply dark. Red, even Valentino red, is no match for the light-absorbing black. And, this year, the colour associated with the grim reaper dominated my parents’ living room, as well as many parts of our island, with as much cheer as fatt choy braised in the company of macerated shiitake mushrooms.

The festive-lite window display at Louis Vuitton

When did red lose favour among the Chinese doing their rounds during Chinese New Year? I don’t know, but I did notice some years back, about eight perhaps, that stores were starting to do away with windows dominated by red. Since 2015, I began to seriously observe. Many, including Louis Vuitton, Dior, Prada, and Fendi, have not bothered with a CNY window, just as they have forgone Christmas. There, too, has been little in terms of merchandise that is red or can be considered gaily festive. Sure, brands know they have to cash in during this period, hence animal-themed offerings to the reflect the Chinese zodiac year, for example. But these are mostly gimmicky rather than trendy, corny rather than snappy. And, they are not as heavy with meaning as red.

Like most, I was never told the true significance of red during CNY. My mother was not big on the colour and wore other brights that didn’t blend in with fire engines or anti-riot vehicles, the ang chia. To the young I, red was an auspicious colour, but from whom I learnt that, I have, hitherto, no idea. It was not until much later, as a young adult, did I read about nian the beast of pre-history China (not nian the year), one so ferocious and life-threatening that only fire, cacophony, and the colour red could send it back in defeat to wherever it came from. Red, synonymous with fire and itself a loud colour, became the choice of those who need to be rid of whatever beastly in life or are in celebratory mood.

At mass market label Iora’s Wisma Atria flagship, main store display shows that red is easily outnumbered

About a week before CNY, I saw a young girl looking admiringly at a plain, flaccid, black dress at Iora in Wisma Atria. I asked if she was buying that to wear as a new outfit for the festive season, she said yes. When I asked her if her choice could keep nian away, she replied with a question: “who’s nian?” I rephrased: why not wear red? Because, she told me—with furrowed brows, none of her friends do and that “it is not cool”. For sure, red is a warm colour and usually with enough heat to be considered passionate. But who, in wanting to look cool, is projecting warmth, passion, intensity, zeal, or energy any more these days? For many now, you may agree, CNY visiting is plain boring. Why bother to meet when you can simply send a WhatsApp message or greeting, if you bother? Or partake in your cousin’s festive fun via his/her IG posts, if you’re interested enough? No new dress required, red or otherwise.

According to one store buyer I know, the colour of chilli was once so in demand that “stores can’t stock enough of red. Nowadays, people don’t bother unless it’s the red that’s within the box logo of Supreme”. She told me that buyers now don’t consciously seek out red to stock in the month of February. It would appear that red is not an important colour in the planning of a collection at all. It isn’t the dominant colour at Louis Vuitton, it is shy at Burberry, and it stands away for the colours of night at Saint Laurent. A look at the men’s collection shows no difference. Kim Jones’s Dior has red conspicuously missing. Even the Kaws pink BFF character (called a “a masterpiece” by the media) dons a black suit! And over at LV, Virgil Abloh’s all-white Keepall, sans pop-up store, has its pride of place in the expensive, faintly psychedelic window.

CK Calvin Klein’s dour black boar

Red is also competing against the equally ancient Chinese sheng xiao zodiac, specifically the 12 animals that purport to predict the ups and downs of one’s life. Until the past five years or so ago, few thought of wearing something bearing the creature that corresponds with their birth animal. I know I never have. But this year, for example, retailers are going big on pigs (CK Calvin Klein is possibly the most prolific), not with charm or pull in every case. Those born in the Year of the Pig are not the only ones wearing porcine prints on their chest, or carrying on their bags. Others of other years do too. Frankly, I can’t reconcile a rat wanting to be a swine.

People are also looking at what colours zodiac masters such as Joey Yap tell them to wear, which means even the bleached of hue such as white may bring you luck on the first day of the Lunar New Year. Sometimes, red is not recommended because it may be too bright, too strong, too potent for an individual. Red may be the colour of luck, but it may not be lucky for you. One of my cousin who came and the only one in non-black wore a supremely dull shade of red that her fortune teller declared most ideal, hence auspicious. It was what I would call puce, that old colour with a history that dates back to the clothing of Marie Antoinette. It’s been described as the shade of dried blood. Or, to be more precise, “brown and maroon with only a hint of pinkish-gray”, according to another description. Apparently, when King Louis XVI saw his wife in a silk dress of said colour, he exclaimed “une puce”! That’s flea!

Photos: Zhao Xiangji

Out With The Old, In With The Old

Posted by Style On The Dot

Relieving Celine of its accent above the ‘e’ is minor change compared to dropping Yves from Yves Saint Laurent, and that perhaps was the point: Hedi Slimane was not planning to reinvent the sewing needle at Celine. Instead, he brought unfinished business at YSL along

Celine SS2019 P1

We guessed it, and yet we were still bothered, perplexed, annoyed. It’s like the end of a romance. You know it’ll soon be over and yet when he/she is gone, you feel the pain, or anger. Hedi Slimane was not expected to expand the look Phoebe Philo left at Céline (as spelled when she was there) the way his successor at Saint Laurent, Anthony Vaccarello, continued Mr Slimane’s rock-chick-waif-groupie look. Yet, we were still dismayed. Perhaps it was the late hour of the live stream (2.45 am!), but mostly it was the annoyance of having to view his last, by-then-repetitive Saint Laurent collection all over again.

We weren’t sure but was the collection about a true singular vision? Mr Slimane is no visionary and his Celine is regrettably short-sighted. Or, was he pleasing an already sizeable fan base of an increasingly commercial rather than innovative fashion business climate? Surely there are those who have remained with Saint Laurent and those who have moved on. Or is this output of a designer that hitherto is, for the most part, one-note? This seemed like indolence at design level: he could have simply bring along the paper patterns from his previous tenure. He was at Saint Laurent for a mere four years (2012 to 2016). Sure, he not only made a huge impact to the fortunes of the house, but also promulgated the idea that luxury fashion can look like fast fashion, which may mean he did not have enough time to really conquer and rule, although divide he arguably did.

Celine SS 2019 G1

Celine SS 2019 G2

The skinny jeans and pants that he popularised at Dior Homme still bolstering ascendancy over other silhouettes in both women’s and men’s wear (even their office clothes!) today is probably not enough. If he wants to leave a lasting legacy, there has to be a persistent aesthetic singularity to better overrun an over-shared world. When Mr Slimane took over Dior Homme in 2000, fashion editors spoke of how he “idolised” teen-ish, waifish rock musicians or such a look. Eighteen years later, at 50, his kind of idolisation could be construed as bordering on the paedophilic, yet it did not bother Mr Slimane or his supporters, including one Karl Lagerfeld, because fashion is, since the advent of pret-a-porter, about youth. He continued with Celine’s debut men’s wear the skinniness and gangliness that he first mooted 18 years ago, as if times have not changed, as if men’s taste have not altered. He even told the media that Celine men’s clothes are unisex, and women are free to buy, which harks back to the female interest in his Dior Homme. Interestingly, he didn’t say that the women’s clothes are unisex and available to men. Remember Phoebe Philo’s Celine appealed to guys, with Pharrell Williams her number one fan?

With a casting that would have the black community cry out tokenism, Mr Slimane again made sure that not only was the Caucasian face his ideal beauty, body diversity was not part of his universe. In fact, these clothes—their smallness, slimness, and shortness—were really for adolescent boys and girls: the boyishness and girlishness augmented by the skinny ties that men past a certain station in life stay clear of and the little dresses with a very fixed waist that women of a certain age normally avoid. Is Mr Slimane’s Celine the new Gap for the children of the wealthy whose numbers are rising all over the world—for certain in Asia? Or is this fashion’s own Peter Pan syndrome?

Celine SS 2019 G4

Some members of the press have taken to justifying Mr Slimane’s design direction than saying that it is lacking in, say, newness (a bad word in fashion these days), among other things. He has proven himself to be a commercially successful designer, they reasoned. Celine, as most people know, is part of LVMH, one of the most powerful luxury conglomerates in the world, if not the most powerful. So there is fear of commercial reprisal. Or, the denial of invitation to future shows. God forbid that a fashion editor should watch live streams like the rest of us! Mr Slimane was known to take umbrage at members of the media who did not share his view or who were not keen in what he did. The relationship between the press and luxury brands has always been a complicated one, and the love-hate relationship, for a lack of better description, is mostly concealed by love, no matter how dismal or disappointing the output of the brands. Love lost, as some journalists—including prominent ones—have learnt, is not nearly recoverable.

At the end of the ~~Celine~~ Hedi Slimane show, there were audible screams of approval. These can’t be construed as anything but love, which means we shall see more of what may be teetering close to ennui: little dresses—black aplenty—and those, equally compact versions, with flourishes such as flounces; boyfriend jackets that, when worn over said dresses, made the latter look even shorter; biker jackets for serious rock cred; and skinny suits that, any skinnier, would be compression wear. Mr Slimane is not the least vague about where he intends to take Celine under his charge. Just because you were given a name at birth and trained to be a lady does not mean that someone, further down the road, can’t lead you astray, and make you a tramp.

Photos: (top) screen shot/Celine live stream, (catwalk) indigital.tv

Midnight Cowboys

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Saint Laurent’s men’s wear under Anthony Vaccarello was presented in New York. Is this another of the brand’s attempt at Americanisation?

Saint Laurent P1

When bands in the European continent want to make it big, they record or launch albums in the good ’ol US of A. The Brits, in particular, consider North America the platform for global domination. From the Beatles to Depeche Mode to One Direction, bands see Uncle Sam as the father of immense riches or the repository of accessible pop. In the Trumpian world, could this be America, “the piggy bank that everybody is robbing”?

Fashion designers, like band members, see the allure of the United States too. Anthony Vaccarello is one of them. His spring/summer 2019 men’s wear collection for the house was shown, not in Paris but in the Big Apple, a city that provided, as he told the media, “the idea of New York, the idea of the icons of New York in the ’70s”. If that immediately sounds like a cliché, it is. The Americans have been robbing the accesses of the disco era for a very long time, so much so that many of them can’t forgo the lurid glam headquartered in the nightclub Studio 54. But the French, such as Yves Saint Laurent himself, want to show the Americans how to do it better. Hedi Slimane, Mr Vaccarello’s predecessor, was also seduced by the US. He even showed in—of all places—LA! Even in the West Coast, you can’t say “icons of New York in the ’70s” wasn’t on his mind.

Saint Laurent G1

Since Mr Slimane’s remake of Saint Laurent for men, the clothes have been part lost hippy, part rock star, part flashy pimp. Mr Vaccarello has not dramatically change the aesthetic, but has added to the equation part urban cowboy. At the New York show, he styled a sort of downtown dandy, a nocturnal peacock (in a beaded paisley blazer!) that occupies his time mostly hanging out with band mates (still the Pete Doherty vibe?), in the most underground of clubs, under the cover of darkness or the hypnosis of the strobe. It was not easy to see how the clothes would fit any activity of daylight hours, unless your line of work involves, say, entertainment. The outfits were mostly dark in shade, glittery in effects, and slim in silhouette.

In fact, the silhouette has not changed much. Since Mr Slimane exported hipster lean to Saint Laurent from Dior Homme, his successor has not deviated from the look. In fact, skinniness has remained central—a skinniness that has, by now, made oversized and baggy positively more interesting. There isn’t anything inherently wrong with slim-fit, but for those who have moved on to something less of a cling wrap, what Mr Vaccarello is proposing seems a little, well, narrow, or restrictive. The body of today deserves a variety of proportions.

Saint Laurent G2 Saint Laurent G3

Within the overall slimness of the silhouette, he added Western touches that few men of horse and lasso would consider authentic. Then there were those unbuttoned-halfway shirts underneath leather jackets, punctuated by a neckerchief—throwback to the ’70s that appeared lame against the signature excesses at Gucci. In addition, those sheer sequinned shirts and sleeveless tops that would have more in common with men of a certain age unable to pull away from the past than the young living in the present. Noteworthy too were the surprisingly large number of jeans, more permutations than even Diesel would churn out per season. And what was the body glitter of the finale about? A nod to the month of Pride?

Look closely and the collection persuaded one to think that it is isn’t terribly inventive by design. Similar to Mr Slimane’s initially divisive approach, Mr Vaccarello had created looks using rather basic clothes in nightclub-worthy fabrics to effect his vision of what he thinks the Americans would like: styles of the ’70s, considered the breakout decade for American designers. The thing is, this may be the most exciting men’s wear season in a long while. Eyes and social media accounts will be trained on the debuts of Virgil Abloh at Louis Vuitton, Kim Jones at Dior Homme, Hedi Slimane at Celine’s very first season for men, Jacquemus’s own, and Riccardo Tisci at Burberry. By the looks of it, Anthony Vaccarello probably did not aim to be the first among peers.

Photos: Saint Laurent

Time To Get Used To This

Posted by Style On The Dot

Nicki Minaj attending a fashion show with one breast exposed and, on our side of the world, the mother openly breastfeeding her child in an MRT train mean one thing: we’re witnessing a new norm… and, possibly, the death of outrage

Warning: The photos that follow and the subject matter of this post may upset some individuals

Nicki Minaj, Paris Fasion Week’s hottest front-row celeb. Photo: gq.com

Fashion is a mirror image of the times, we have been constantly told. And that was what Anthony Vaccarello held up for Saint Laurent last month (actually, also last year): the reflection of the style of our time. How wrong we were to think no woman would wish to have her breasts feel the warmth of sunshine and the caress of afternoon breeze, unhindered by the presence of cloth, in full public view.

The first to prove us wrong was Nicki Minaj. Her constant scantiness makes Madonna’s bra-as-outer-wear antics look positively vestal. Now, Ms Minaj is into showing a whole breast—its entirety not the least diminished by the use of a pasty. This was clearly one bare bosom at the Haider Ackermann show in Paris last week, and one uncovered for maximum social media impact. At first, she was accused of copying Lil’ Kim. Possibly indignant, the Anaconda singer then did something very clever; she came out saying that she was, in fact, inspired by Pablo Picasso’s work (reportedly the 1908 painting Femme a l’éventail). That dirty old man!

The thing is, art has always depicted women with one exposed (mostly left) breast (as if two are over-expressive and titillating). Ms Minaj did not explain why she picked Picassso. She could have been inspired by so many other painters of one exposed breast, from Francesco Melzi to Auguste Renoir to Paul Gauguin, but she chose a leading Cubist known for eroticism in his work. It is possible that in directing her motive to something related to art, Ms Minaj was saying that her exposed breast was an artistic expression. Life never used to imitate art this way. Wasn’t it all in the artist’s vivid/weird imagination? Surely women didn’t think such exposure inspirational?

Picasso femme à l'éventail Pablo Picasso’s Femme a l’éventail. Photo: Musée de l’Ermitage, Leningrad

The second was the woman breastfeeding in an MRT train, and now in the middle of the furore that has divided Netizens this past week. She should have taken the cue from Nicki Minaj. Her exposed breast was a nursing breast, and art is full of bosoms as source of infantile sustenance. Her rejoinder to the post on Stomp could have gone something like this: “I was inspired by Hans Baldung, specifically Virgin and Child.” Surely that would not have caused quite such a stir as the rebuke: “Those who suggest using a cover should try eating or drinking under a cover and see if you like it or not.” Or, the rant: “Anyway, it’s just a breast. We all have it. Be it female or male. It’s meant to be used to feed a baby, I don’t see anything wrong with using it to feed a baby… Maybe girls should stop eating bananas/popsicle in public as some might find it sexual too”—both from her Facebook post, which was defiantly accompanied by more breastfeeding photos.

(Let’s leave aside the fact that men do not usually lactate for now.)

As noted by historian Margaret R. Miles in her book A Complex Delight: The Secularization of the Breast 1350—1750, bosoms were considered religious symbols. Of the Virgin’s symbols: “in early modern Western societies in which Christianity was the dominant religion,” Ms Miles wrote, “her bare breast, appearing in paintings and sculptures, signified nourishment and loving care—God’s provision for the Christian, ever in need of God’s grace.” Who would want to incur the wrath of our National Council of Churches (NCCS) by criticising a woman who merely exposed her breast the way Mary did?

Without the religious advantage, it is, of course, naïve of that woman to think that she was not going to get a secular reaction to her very secular (and public) display. There are basically three ways to respond to this: negatively, neutrally, and positively. Interestingly (perhaps, hearteningly?), many reacted positively—even encouragingly, with some saying it is the most natural thing for a woman to do. The breast’s provision to the child, so many in the pro camp seem to say, obliterates its very nakedness, so much so that you see—if you did see—nothing more than a mother feeding.

Virgin and Child by Hans Baldung. Photo: Public Domain / Wikimedia Commons

But that trending photograph revealed something else. In her substantial FB post, that woman also said, “I just want to dress up and be a normal woman…” Here, if one were to equate “dress up” to what she wore on that fateful MRT ride, one could see that being in one’s best clothes meant one need not don very much of a dress (according to Lianhe Wanbao, she was on her way to participating in Mrs Singapore. Now you see). She was, therefore, dressed up since dressing up with little that constitutes an outfit is now a normal-womanly thing to do. Her easy-to-pull-down strapless top and a skirt (possibly shorts)—so brief that it is not unreasonable to suspect that both are of equal lengths—bear out the observation that, increasingly, it takes very little cloth to make clothes.

If so much of what we see online is not fake (catchword of the year), fashion is not about clothes. How much you cover is immaterial. Materials, in fact, are secondary just as coverage is no longer the real reason to wear clothes since so little is covered. As more and more celebrities and stars have shown, fashion can exist without garments, or, with incomplete garments. Once the stage personae of more audacious performers—from Josephine Baker to Gypsie Lee Rose to Dita Von Tesse—whose rectitude of motives were never really questioned since their dare-to-bare ways were mostly restricted to the theatre, the exposed body is today very much a part of everyday dress.

As it turns out, the uncovered buttocks of the past years weren’t the last fashion frontier (Azealia Banks, you’re passé!) Now, we aren’t even sure if the bare breast is. The fine line between decency and indecency strangely sits on not much expanse of space—the nipple. Unblocked, it causes offense in the same way the narrow border between the glutes seen will crack the barrier of politeness. The obscuring of the areola, within which the nipple lies (the exit point of breast milk), therefore, lessens the lewdness of the breast bared and, in many nations, stays within the confines of the law. Whether covered by a pasty or the mouth of a hungry infant, the areola unseen, it appears (or suggested by the MRT woman), strips away the sexual aspect of the sole naked bosom. You must appreciate, instead, the epitome of womanhood or, baby in sight, motherhood. Or a fashion statement.

Rapper Lil’ Kim pre-empting Nicki Minaj at the 2013 MTV Video Music Awards. Photo: Getty Images

For a long time, fashion advertising has allowed us to wean on the normality of the barely covered breast. Who can remember a time when Guess models did not appear to be on the verge of full exposure? But there has always been the divide of they-are-models/we-are-real-women. It’s quite different now. In today’s fashion, familiarity does not always breed contempt. Rather, it fosters assimilation, more so than in art. With social media adherents willing and eager to push fashion messages further towards the extreme, women are willing to follow whoever they follow under the security blanket called “in charge of my own destiny”. Or, as Ivanka Trump says, “Own your femininity”.

Even self-confessed feminist Emma Watson has no qualms of exposing—even not in their entirety—her breasts, as seen in the latest issue of Vanity Fair. To the disapproving masses, she would later say, “They were claiming that I couldn’t be a feminist and have boobs. Feminism is about giving women choice… It’s about freedom; it’s about liberation; it’s about equality.” And she meant not just the freedom, liberation, and equality of the mind, but the body too. She added, “I don’t know what my tits have to do with it”. Which sounded like: I can flash my chest as men can, and do. The interesting thing is, her leading man Dan Stevens had not had to pose in a shirt completely unbuttoned in any magazine to promote Beauty and the Beast.

Ms Watson’s position seems consistent with the agenda of Free the Nipple, the 2014 American docu-film and campaign that not only pushed for gender equality, but also put forth the argument that women be allowed to bare their nipples in public if they choose to. This goes swimmingly with what women have, of late, been told they can do with their bodies, regardless of shape and condition: as you please. They can emulate models or social-media stars, even when they are neither models nor social-media stars. They can show any part of their body on Instagram, even when the world will bear witness to their display and there could be backlash. Eff those who can’t deal with this reality. If dominance is part of what constitutes popularity, then the increasing visibility of bare breasts is going to point, if it has not already, to how we shall dress, and how undisrupting to social norms it shall become.

A one-bare-breast-dress by Anthony Vaccarello for Saint Laurent, spring/summer 2017. Photo: indigital.tv

A dress or blouse or jacket that does not require the portion that covers or enhances the bosom is perhaps also indication that the bust of the garment is redundant. It is quite possible that designers want to do away with that part of the dress, just as many seem to want to rid the area where the shoulder meets the sleeve, allowing it to go “cold”. Anyone with knowledge of dressmaking knows that the bust is often tricky to construct. Fashion students in pattern-making class are known to hate pivoting darts, so much so that many do away with them. The result is often a cut-away bodice comprising two pieces of cloths simply for front and back. Either that or a stretchy fabric such as jersey to cling to every curve and protuberance.

It would be wild speculation to think that Anthony Vaccarello was trying to shirk from creating the most beautifully formed bust on the Saint Laurent dress by not including one, even if it was only on one side. Although in that outfit Mr Vaccarello did not quite “free the nipple”, his predecessor did. In 2015, Hedi Slimane created a permanent and irreversible wardrobe malfunction with a dress that literally covered only half the body, exposing a starkly naked breast. No member of the media seemed particularly disturbed, with vogue.com calling it “fall’s hot topic on the runway”. It must have been, for Olympia Le-Tan even designed a dress with a trompe l’oeil left-breast-exposed—just in case there were those who wanted to bare, but did not dare.

It is suggested that the present fixation with exposing the boob is really backlash against too much easy androgyny and minimalism bordering on the monastic. There’s nothing wrong with an aesthetic that is expressly and visibly female. However, there are no half-measures in fashion. If we look back, we’ll remember that the décolletage soon gave way to the plunging V; the peeking thigh soon gave way to the glaring rump; the blushing crack—left open by the “bumster”—soon led to the full-moon derrière; and the buttocks soon gave up the seat to the bosom. If today is one breast out, will tomorrow be freedom for the other side?

And You Wonder Why Women Won’t Sit Properly

Posted by Style On The Dot

Saint Laurent SS 2017 advertising

Ugly clothes, it seems, aren’t quite enough. They need to be marketed with ugly images of models in ugly poses too—triple the ugliness. The house of Saint Laurent got themselves in a bit of a spot a couple of days ago when uproar broke out over two of their latest advertising images for the spring/summer 2017 season. We won’t describe the pictures; we let you see what the indignation is all about for yourself.

The photos used in the Saint Laurent ads do open us up to one question: Why is the pose of the model, rather than the clothes she wears, the focal point of a fashion advertisement? It is perturbing to think that this is a reflection of the evolving taste of the consumers of fashion, but it is more disquieting to consider this an indication of how women now see themselves: individuals who can be viewed between their legs, and not face, first.

Of course, a woman seated with her legs apart is so common a sight that no one will think it a show of impropriety. After all, we are no longer in an era when not wearing a petticoat is tantamount to not wearing a brassiere. The panty now cheerfully looking out to the world between the shredded crotch of denim cut-offs is so inoffensive that nobody really cares anymore how a woman sits, or squats, or stoops.

And so she places herself on a chair, seat, or floor as she pleases, legs spread in a way that nearly renders her asunder. Or feet up on the seat so that a heel can cushion the backside, or a knee can serve as chin rest. Comfort is key, we have been told, and that means you do not loll at home, you do it before a camera. You do not kick up your heels when nobody is around, you do it when there is an audience. You do not curl up in private confines, you do so on any chair, anywhere—on the ground, in the air.

The Saint Laurent ad controversy comes just a week after Kellyanne Conway, President “Taped Tie” Trump’s able Counselor, was photographed seated with her legs tucked behind her rear on the sofa of the Oval Office. Ms Conway was, of course, more modestly seated compared to the model in the Saint Laurent ad, but it does draw our attention to the fact that many women now choose to take to a chair in a manner that challenges traditional ideas of lady-like demeanour.

Drawing a viewer’s attention to a woman’s full-frontal crotch is, of course, not new. Just last year, Calvin Klein Underwear put out an advertising image that was framed as an up-skirt shot. Something is also being said when mothers do not chastise little girls for seating with their underpants in full public view, even when unintended. Such indifference and advertising media that has adopted perceptibly suggestive poses in place of nudity to sell clothing allow the young to be weaned on the scanty as standard

Nudity in the media has lost much if its potency. It is a visual marketing device since the ’70s—it has been in use for too long. Yves Saint Laurent himself posed nude in 1971 for his first men’s fragrance in a campaign shot by Jeanloup Sieff. He did not have a shred of clothing on, yet one cannot say he was the epitome of a sex god. As we are now constantly told, just because there are no clothes on does not mean it’s sending out a salacious message. A nude body is no prelude to sex. In order to communicate sex, the message today has to be obviously about sex. Even with clothes on, fishnet stockings too, sex can be the core suggestion when you zero in on the area of the body where sex usually takes place. Better still, the legs positioned like a triangle that frames the other triangle.

But how does making visual the object of another’s voyeuristic or onanistic pleasure help sell clothes? Maybe selling is not the point, controversy is.

Ain’t No Saint in This Laurent

Posted by Style On The Dot

saint-lauren-aw-2017-pic1

Last season, there were at least pasties to cover the nipples. This time, Anthony Vaccarello left the areolae fully exposed, as if there were any woman who would not get themselves on the wrong side of the law by going bare mamilla. It’s not certain if anyone looking at the looks Mr Vaccarello proposed as sexy, or tasteless, but he was on track to cover one of two major trends in fashion: extreme sexiness and over-the-top decorative. Are there really so many women who want to look provocative? Or wanton? Or aggressive?

There’s something menacing about Mr Vaccarello’s Saint Laurent. Maybe it’s all that leather (as in the last season). Or maybe it’s the colour or the lack of. Or maybe it’s just these angry times when a certain toughness in dress is too literal a front to tackle social aggression. Sure, we could be reading too much into it. These clothes have no place in the part of the wardrobe a woman goes to when she needs something for work, to take the children to school or meet the mother-in-law for tea in. These are outfits, if the shine of the leathers is any indication, for a certain setting where strobe lights and proximity to a bar lend the wearer an enhanced cool.

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And that could mean a top with just one sleeve. Mr Vaccarello seems to love the single sleeve, and now, a detachable one too that can be worn on the other otherwise exposed arm. But the two are not quite the same, as if unalike due to some genetic aberration. The removable one works like a hybrid sleeve-glove, where the upper portion opens up like a carnivorous fluted flower, exposing a shearling underside, the deltoid consumed. It’s not certain if these one-sleeves will be sold separately, as they do with handbags, but they sure will send very active IG users into a state of delirium.

Unconsciously, we drifted to Louis Vuitton. For spring/summer 2017, Nicolas Ghesquière, too, had some leather pieces, one-sleeve jackets, and a few very sheer dresses. Only thing visibly missing: totally exposed breasts. We know that cover has become totally unimportant in fashion, but is Mr Vaccarello’s insistence on the breast in full exhibition mode fashion design or cheap trick? Surely the Kardashian clan constitutes a very small clientele?

saint-lauren-aw-2017-pic3

And there are those angular extensions, which could be his answer to his predecessor’s pussy bows. Mr Vaccarello is creating his own signature, of course, using ruffles in more superfluous ways than possible. Whether extending past the person next to the wearer, or swirling from bodice to skirt like a candy wrapper, his ruffles have the uncanny ability to be both ornamentation, and unneeded—totally selfie-friendly.

Perpetual fans would be able to point out the YSL references, however subtle, which is, of course, not the point since it is doubtful that anyone who has gravitated to the brand since Hedi Slimane’s tenure would notice, or care. We are not expecting any reiteration of the four-button double-breasted blazer that’s nipped in the waist; not the relaxed, belted safari suit; the ruffled peasant dresses. But must Anthony Vaccarello erase everything that we remember Yves Saint Laurent for? Apparently so.

Photos: indigital.tv

Do Pussy Bows Have Nine Lives Too?

Posted by Style On The Dot

Melania Trump, in a pussy bow blouse, beaming with confidence. Photo: Getty Images

Art, they say, imitates life. Sometimes, fashion does too. This morning (our time), for instance. During the 2nd US presidential debate broadcast, just before the opponents spoke, the camera zoomed in on Melania Trump shaking the hand of former president Bill Clinton. That in itself wasn’t significant. But her outfit caused quite a bit of speculation on Twitter. Are the colour, apparently one of Hillary Clinton’s faves, and the matching top and bottom—although not a pantsuit—together a signal that the wife of the most controversial presidential hopeful in America’s democratic history is casting her approval towards camp Clinton?

Read what you may into her option, what struck us is the blouse, more specifically the pussy bow. Surely when “grab them by the pussy” is trending after her husband’s deplorable 2005 off-camera but hot-mic performance was exposed by The Washington Post, her choice of attire must mean something. Is she telling the world that, even after 11 years of marriage, there is no competition, and she’s still up for Donald Trump’s grabs? Mrs Trump is, by most accounts, a feminine woman. Surely she would not need a detail of dress once associated with Margaret Thatcher and what the latter had called “rather softening” effect in the corridors of power. Or was this merely Melania Trump following fashion?

Hedi Simane’s pussy bow blouse for Saint Laurent shown during Paris Fashion Week in 2012. Photo: Monica Feudi/feudiguaineri.com

As we know, in fashion, sometimes enough is just not enough. Since Hedi Slimane reintroduced the pussy bow at his debut for Saint Laurent back in 2012, this icing on the blouse has not melted or flowed down. You’d think that by now, it’s left out in the rain (excuse us, we’ve been humming the Richard Harris tune!) for too long. But up to the recent fashion weeks, the pussy bow isn’t showing any signs of retirement. We doubt even Mr Slimane had thought that what he revived would stick around longer than his tenure at Saint Laurent.

As if the trickle-down effect of that intro was not enough, the pussy bow was given a glamorous new lease of life by Gucci’s Alessandro Michele in 2015. It appeared in both the men’s and women’s collections, and has flourished happily since then. After so many seasons (and languishing in the likes of Forever 21), you’d think that this floppy bow that shares the disparaging slang name of female genitalia would have gone to its grave. It has not. Melania Trump showed how alive it is, even surrendering it in pink!

Pussy bows SS 2017.jpg Just some of the pussy bows of spring/summer 2017. Photos: Indigital

It is possible that Mrs Trump’s confidence in wearing the pussy bow to a globally televised event is bolstered by its continued appearance on international catwalks. This season, with new creative heads taking over heritage houses, it’s not unreasonable to hope that something that by now is a woeful cliché won’t pop up like post-precipitation mushrooms. Yet it did. At Dior, a pussy bow on a sleeveless blouse really had no reason to be on the runway, but it appeared—the tail ends swinging as gloriously as a flag on a windless day.

What’s the real appeal of the pussy bow anyway? It’s hard to say. Minimalism, together with discretion, has gone into hibernation while decoration and excess are having a magnificent moment. Some fashion items do not retire easily just as some trends have a grip that’s hard to shake loose. Will the pussy-bow blouse be the next denim shorts with shredded crotch? In the case of Melania Trump’s blouse—by Gucci, as reported—could it be intended irony or an allegory of wifely support? Some pussies, as Donald Trump learned with dismay and to his campaign’s detriment, just have more lives.