The weather in Paris has gotten so out of hand that Dior had to move its show from 2:30pm to 9am. For his third menswear outing, Jonathan Anderson chose the Musée Nissim de Camondo, with its vast, beautiful gardens, as his show location. It is the former home of baker Moïse de Camondo, who had a massive collection of 18th century decorative arts. Anderson, an avid art collector himself, commissioned Giangiacomo Rossetti to paint a series of portraits of models wearing the collection that were displayed inside the museum. They looked as if they could’ve been hanging there for decades.
Anderson’s tenure at Dior has been defined by bridging the past with the present, blurring then with the now. His menswear is guided by the archives, where elements of Monsieur Dior’s couture designs are re-contextualised. He commissioned Fred again… to create a custom mix for the show that welded the sounds of KTNA, Mabe Fratti and Jamie T, with original vocals from Christine and the Queens. Fred again… is magpie-like in sampling speech pulled from social media and voice notes to help build his tracks. Anderson’s likens his approach to remixing, like a musician would, where the “familiar is transformed and the subtle, magnified”, as written in his show notes.
Here, the tuxedo was relieved of its stuffiness when cut from a light organza and printed with a houndstooth check, moving elegantly as models walked. Throughout, Anderson danced between eras. Classic white dinner jackets were paired with ripped jeans and sneakers, and robe-style trench coats were worn with glittery skinny trousers and workwear shirts. In these delightful mismatched moments, Anderson created a look that is cohesive and utterly desirable.
Photography courtesy of Dior.
