A string of airport flight announcements kept Margiela fans entertained in the minutes before the start of this morning’s Maison Margiela show.
Look 1 and a camel raincoat chopped at the hem and yoke and pulled tight to become an off-shoulder short dress. After that more raincoats stripped back to their various components: the lining, the placket, the collar; all the “innards” for all to see. And wear on separate occasions.
Was there a mix-up in baggage handling? Had designer John Galliano walked into ‘Lost Luggage’? Some of the girls had those self-adhesive luggage tags holding their ponytails in place.
There were various suits and dresses too, which played with vintage wallpaper print fabrics inserted with sections of similar ones. Then, every so often, another play on yet another raincoat: one was see-through, one gold jacquard. It was chaotic and beautiful, dynamic and mad.
Maribou was everywhere: in the hair, trimming cutaway cardis traced with shiny bits and diamanté; inserted into coats and tops. The styling (clothes, hair and makeup) was, as always, something quite incredible: glitter dipped hair; swimming caps, long-haul flight neck pillows; old-school card-and-string address tags hanging off a bag or from the corner of a raincoat. What a brilliant brilliant thing to witness. What a brilliant brilliant show.
Photographs by Jason Lloyd Evans