“Many in the audience”—which included Alexander McQueen, by the way—“were taken aback by the simplicity and naïveté of Rei Kawakubo’s sweet white lace tunics and scallop-edged Babe Paley dresses,” wrote Vogue of Comme des Garçons’s Spring ’99 collection. “Let’s face it, prim and proper is not what the world expects from the doyenne of the avant-garde.” Prim might be a slight exaggeration; some of the sheaths here hewed to a business-in-the-front-party-in-the-back philosophy.
And while there were half-jackets and half-skirts in addition to dresses with different fronts and backs, there was none of the “she’s come undone” feeling that Kawakubo’s deconstruction sometimes has. Rather, everything was neat and orderly in a sort of early 1960s way. Among the standouts were bright white shifts made of laser-cut fabrics. These were worn with slip-ons or Mary Janes, red lips, and exaggerated pompadours set upon or behind center-parted and marcelled hair like halos.
