With designers exploding couture’s clichés, the future of form seems to be very different.
Robert Wun
Couture is the pinnacle of fashion as an art form; the distillation of a designer’s artistic vision and talent. It is also a playground for new ideas – both a mirror and a crystal ball, reflecting what is and showing what’s to come. At the FW23 couture shows, Thom Browne upended what a sleeve could be (and seem), while Balenciaga weaponized dresses into rigid, overstated contours. The shape of things to come, it seems, is anything but normal.
Iris van Herpen
“Risk-taking is the fun of it all,” says celebrity stylist Karla Welch. After visiting couture shows in Paris with Tracee Ellis Ross, Welch immediately snagged a mountainous hot pink Valentino gown for Ross to wear to the 2018 Emmys. “This dress was so extreme at the time,” Welch notes. “That moment shifted volume and silhouette on the red carpet.” It’s a trend that has only gained momentum, as stars and normies alike step away from conventional mermaid dresses and LBDs. Welch has since put Kristen Wiig in a Valentino dress with vertical ruffles for the 2020 Academy Awards, and Sarah Paulson in a Louis Vuitton two-piece with a square crop top for the 2022 Emmy Awards. The hourglass is out, the quadrilateral is in – as is the cylinder, the cone, and the balloon.
Viktor & Rolf
Thierry Mugler’s alien women, Viktor & Rolf’s ultra-exaggerated tailleurs, and Iris van Herpen’s circle shapes representing infinity are all pioneering avant-garde couture statements. Daniel Roseberry is mainstreaming the new unconventionality since his arrival at Schiaparelli in 2019. The Texan designer took a maison known for its surrealist daring and reinvented it for the modern age, showing that Elsa Schiaparelli’s singular spirit lives on. He continued the irreverence with his SS23 couture, playing especially with trompe-l’oeil shoulders and stiff, undulating waves. Chinese designer…
