The pink sand was a La Vie en Rose tribute to Paris Plages, the by-the-Seine temporary beach that this marvelous city sets up for its citizens to flirt on every summer. However, the clothes, said Alexandre Mattiussi backstage preshow, were a tribute to a non-French Parisian phenomenon: the tourist. That rather seemed like wishful thinking. For if every tourist currently milling the sidewalks was really dressed in Ami, then Paris would be an even more beautiful place.
Mattiussi’s color palette was inspired by Legos, a bold and zingy chorus of green, pink, and red. The clothes were half casual parody, half Platonic ideal of current menswear tropes. Diner shirts strafed by twin pillars of color played against broadly articulated denim. Double denim short-jacket combos in powerful stripes or even more powerful florals were perfectly done. Too-heavy-for-the-weather jersey-bonded macs with contra-color cuffs were for the thunderstorm we all wanted to come. The only unbelievable bit was the gorgeous clashing check suiting with un-corporately expressive soft silhouettes—it was too good to be true. The bonded leather shorts and jackets were perhaps a little too shiny to really shine, but there was barely anything to protest in a collection unified by its drooping belt straps. Mattiussi said: “I didn’t want to think too much. It was just let’s put in things that we really love to wear. Not to try to make it too complicated. To make it easy, sexy, cool.” Check, check, and check again.
