There’s no one like Demna for nailing the precise geist of the zeit in his Balenciaga shows, on both micro and macro scales. He has previously swiped wide, making statements that resonate far wider than the fashion world – witness his awe-inspiring and terrifying Fall 2022 collection, initially a comment about climate change radically recontextualised by the Russian assault against Ukraine.
But this season, Demna was thinking about fashion. Or, rather, clothes. His clothes, both the ones he wears and the ones he makes, and the clothes he wants to put out into the world. It was evident before you’d seen a single garment, with an insistent soundtrack of the voice of Isabelle Huppert reading aloud instructions to the complex process of creating a tailoring jacket. Gradually overlaid by a thumping soundtrack of techno, by the crescendo Huppert’s dulcet monologue had become a howling scream for attention. A cry out for fashion to be the focus? Perhaps pointedly, Huppert’s screams were most insistent around descriptions of the construction of the sleeve, the perfection of which was Cristóbal Balenciaga’s passion and source of pain. When he designed the uniforms for Air France in the 1960s, apparently, Balenciaga wanted to fit the sleeves of each of the 3,000 or so jackets himself.
The collection itself was declared to be “a tribute to crafting the garment” but it was, in fact, far more complex. This show represented a battle between craftsmanship and showmanship, which you sense often in Demna’s work and which is also at play in the industry at large. Should fashion shows be about grabbing headlines via celebrities either attendance or modelling the clothes, or harnessing attention for the clothes? Which gives the bigger pay-off for the company? And for the designer – as, honestly, designers do want their clothes to be worn? As Demna’s Balenciaga models finished filing out, you were thinking of all these things, as well as considering the power and impact of the garments themselves.
If Demna had ‘personalities’ modelling his collection, few could be considered celebrities. Rather, they were individuals who were significant to Demna’s own life: his mother opened the show, his husband closed it dressed in a wedding gown. There was a shriek of recognition when the celebrated fashion critic Cathy Horyn sauntered around, in sunglasses and a mangled suit; likewise when the faultlessly elegant Lionel Vermeil, director of luxe prospective at Kering and the man who originally hired Demna for Balenciaga, appeared. He wore heels. Also in the mix was Balenciaga PR director Robin Meason (who seated guests before taking to the stage) and his former tutor, Linda Loppa.
If this wasn’t quite the joyous, riotous experience of Demna’s Spring 2022 Balenciaga show (the premiere of that Balenciaga-branded episode of The Simpsons), it had a celebratory air. After a quiet Autumn/Winter show, Demna here was reclaiming and restaking his territory. And when it came to construction, these garments confounded easy explanation, with multiple layers, mismatching buttoning, and extra sleeves lopping and slopping around. You half-wished Huppert was talking you through their conception and construction, so ingenious were the forms. Not least the evening wear – generally speaking, fashion at its safest and most banal – where Demna opted to recycle and amalgamate existing gowns into new pieces. The wedding dress was formed from seven pre-existing models. As in the March show, Demna created some of the pieces himself.
So, if this show was a continuation of Demna’s re-engagement with the act of making, it was also an evolution and elaboration. It pushed craft literally onto a stage – the catwalk was hung with thick velvet drapes, like a theatre – and made it the focal point of an extravaganza. It felt less like a paring back or stripping down, more like hackles raised – an act of defiance. Demna seemed to be asserting that he could make just as much noise (literally, and metaphorically) with Balenciaga’s clothes as he used to with pyrotechnics. And certainly, it arrested our attention equally.
If we are dumbing things down, it was also a collection that reiterated Balenciaga’s contemporary identity as a source of pieces that capture popular imagination and slipstream straight into wardrobes. A new handbag, dangling open and hung with gewgaws in beaten leather, looked eminently and immediately desirable. A collection satisfying all demands, then.
