PARIS COUTURE FINALE
LOUIS FERAUD: Yvan Mispelaere’s complex designs push the notion of the couture’s wild exuberance to the extreme.
In his third couture outing for the house, his prodigious imagination dissected the Renaissance, which offered much of the collection’s inspiration, sometimes with fencing references in ornate lingerie-like bodysuits evocative of delicate armor. But Mispelaere threw many other ideas into the mix, from military details and industrial zippers to layers of lace that created romantic volumes. Limiting his repertoire mostly to off-white canvas toile, a metaphor for the beauty of the unfinished, he left the pattern markings on many outfits. It made for a technically accomplished maelstrom that when tempered, as in a sweeping canvas jacket finished with military epaulettes and a panel of velvet cutting down the back or a beautifully executed red velvet skirt, was at its best. Mispelaere has interesting ideas about silhouette, but sometimes they’re excessive. If he could control them, the results would be more poetic.
HANAE MORI: An East-meets-West leitmotif coursed through Mori’s show, which sang the praises of her native Japan. With her customer at the forefront of her mind, she sent out a host of suits decorated with butterfly jewelry perched on the shoulder. But what the designer really did well were a smattering of colorful kimono coats, many decorated with fur on the collar or sleeves. Their voluminous shapes communicated a subtle elegance that is the essence of her couture.