September 7, 2019 |
Fashion has had some rather oddball fixations over the past nine months. Think McDonald’s couture (courtesy of Vetements), and of course those inflatable balloons by Fredrik Tjaerendsen. Yet no one has been able to topple the attention Japanese designer Tomo Koizumi sopped up with his pastel-hued polyester organza gowns. Nurtured by fashion’s fairy-godmother Katie Grand who discovered his talent via Instagram, Koizumi’s big fluffy loofah dresses plonked themselves inside every major fashion mag on both sides of the Atlantic, wiping clean any sign of competition. Last night, Koizumi returned to Marc Jacobs’ Madison Avenue store for his sophomore outing, without last season’s stellar cast of supermodels in sight.
18-year-old model and artist Ariel Nicholson was a lone soldier, as she changed in-and-out of Koizumi’s latest technicoloured fluff balls like a Barbie on Christmas morning. Coneheads seemed to be on Guido Palau’s hair memo as Nicholson staggered about the room – the ruffles following each thrash and sway like a lost puppy. Ruffles were stuffed into bodysuits, swollen into tentacle-like extra limbs and appliquéd in dainty bows. One all-white look even signalled toward Koizumi’s very first wedding dress moment. Ruffles upon ruffles smashing into each other and a veil pointing to the sky – transforming Nicholson into some kind of giant squid that had somehow found its way to a couture atelier. It was hi-glam, hi-camp and totally unrealistic. But isn’t that what fashion’s all about?
