Isaac Hindin Miller reports from the French capital on the latest in winter menswear fashions.
Thom Browne
There's a risk a designer takes when he selects one of the final slots of the week on the show schedule. Attending presentations and glamorous soirees might sound like a lot of swanning around, but by the end of it all, the audience can start to feel (and look) like
they've hit a brick wall.
It's a risk that Thom Browne has taken twice - first last season, when he showed his fantastical 1950s astronauts in the former Communist party headquarters of Paris, and again this year, at the grand ballroom inside the Westin Hotel on Place Vendome.
Inside, a banquet was in progress. A 15-metre-long table laden with roasted turkeys and fruit and wine and taxidermy magpies sat before the crowd, around which 40 boys in white lead makeup picked daintily at their plates of corn kernels and julienne carrots.
It was a turn-of-the-century dinner party, but conversation was scant. Instead, every so often, a select group of guests - dressed in Thom Browne period costume - would circle the table at snail's pace.
Thom Browne is not one to shy away from going the whole hog, and thus, alongside the typical shrunken grey suit (of which there was just one), a raft of 19th century characters appeared in appropriate garb.
The Artful Dodger strolled out, cane in tow, with breeches and overcoat trailing to the floor. There were passively monk-strapped valets in maroon short pants, with plaited-woollen-beanies-as-wigs hanging from their heads.
And in one of the more hilarious moments of the season, The Boogie Down Bronx kid himself, Yuri Pleskun, sauntered past wearing a dove grey, tres femme woollen pinafore.
A calculated risk can pay dividends, and where fashion shows are concerned, Thom Browne is a sure thing.
At the end of a long, cold season, when collections are merging into one another and you've exhausted all your adjectives for describing a pair of pants, all one can really ask for is to be entertained.
Thom Browne is the host with the most.
Eleven peculiarities at Comme des Garcons
1. Teased and permed strawberry blonde wigs, with no attempt whatsoever to disguise the fact that they were, in fact, fake hair.
2. Full, floor-length skirts worn surprisingly well by young men.
3. Models coming out at odd intervals. Not just to be quirky or different, but because the casting at CDG shows is always a little lean. Most designers choose 20-30 boys to showcase 35-45 odd looks on, this show featured 11 with multiple changes. Sometimes they just couldn't come out as quickly as might be expected. But that's okay, it just added to the atmosphere.
4. Pants so baggy you could fit seven legs in them.
5. Vintage-look clothing that really does look (and quite possibly is) old, including tee shirts emblazoned with images of what looked to be 90s R'n'B bands.
6. Intricately patterned Chinese silk nighties worn as daywear.
7. In the foyer, a group of diehard Comme fans who wore brightly coloured woollen hats like little garden gnomes.
8. No bow at end of the show - as usual, Rei Kawakubo stayed out of sight. You don't get much more humble, or subversive, than that.
9. Models who took their time on the catwalk. At any other show, they adopt a serious forward lean and charge down the runway. At Comme des Garcons, the boys dawdled like only the cool can.
10. Classical singing was played at a moderate level, which allowed for other noises to permeate the room. You could hear the photographers clicking and the clinking of coat hangers on racks as the models changed outfits.
11. By the end of it, you really wanted to own one of those skirts.
* For more from Isaac, see isaaclikes.com.
