When a show runs 43 minutes late (due to the wrong time-zone arrival of some French grande fromage, and no fault of the label), there is a lot of opportunity to speculate about the delights ahead. Thanks to an invitation illustrated by a close-up of tousled hair on a bare back, the best guess seemed to be a feminized reprise of creative director Sébastien Meunier’s borderline trichophiliac menswear ode to Apollonian beauty. When at last the looks emerged, however, it became clear that his feminine cipher for next winter had fallen (and was reveling in it). Meunier said afterward the music was an important signifier. The two-entry playlist eddied between “Screen Shot” by Swans (sample lyric: “No pain, no death, no fear, no hate, no time, no now, no suffering”) and a depressive cover of Joy Division’s “Love Will Tear Us Apart.” So . . . not upbeat. As Meunier said, “We all want to have no pain when we love, but in reality we all have
it—and it also makes life.” Oof.
That translated into a long reflection on gently exploded masculine attire. Black topcoats featured yawing hemlines and the odd loose strap. The waistcoat was promoted into a metaphor for depth via carefully sculpted, counterintuitive layering. The odd metallic flash—and later slim pants and another topcoat in silver metallic fabric—provided a bit of roughage to temper the noir. So did an abstract print of out-of-focus streetlights reproduced on slim leather pants, wide-cuffed wool pants, a ribbed semi-sheer turtleneck, and—yes—another topcoat. Thai pant–style overfolding occasionally graced Meunier’s trousers, and there were a few folded split skirts and dresses inserted to broaden the rubber-sole–shod silhouette a little, too. That hair tease on the invitation wasn’t totally plucked from the air—the models all wore plaits of dark horsehair insinuated within the knotted disarray of their own hair. This was a collection to wear while moodily smoking 20 unfiltered Gitanes at a sidewalk café.
