Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren, dandy gentlemen that they are, are tireless campaigners for the suit, the coat, the tux, and the tie in the many twisted mutations that, season after season, they propose it. This season's sartorial moment was brought to you by leather and bulk. Designers are betting big on the leather pant making a comeback in the Fall, but few went as far as Horsting and Snoeren did, showing skin trousers with silk jacquard tuxedo jackets, or leather overalls with proper shirts and ties. On top, their offerings tended toward the round and padded. There were fur-collared puffer parkas, bulging-armed sweaters, leather bombers, and chesterfields, all sporting the same exaggerated, inflated shoulder shapes.
Backstage, the designers mentioned their Fall 1998 women's collection, Atomic Bomb, as this collection's inspiration and predecessor. In that show, too, they inflated silhouettes to mushroom-cloud proportions. But an equal influence was exerted by a newer bomb in the V & R arsenal: Spicebomb, the just-debuted cologne counterpart to their best-selling women's Flowerbomb scent. Spicebomb's grenade-shaped bottle echoed the lines of the silhouettes, and the face of its new campaign, Sean O'Pry, closed the show. "He spiced up the season," Snoeren said backstage. Smells like a reminder that fashion shows are about many things, and clothing is only one of them.
