Today’s Ann Demeulemeester show began with an androgynous figure who looked to be in mourning: a large-brimmed hat swirling with black tulle concealed the face, a languid black suit extended down the body, and a hand gloved in lace held a blackened rose. The show ended with a timelessly feminine figure whose ivory lace dress, draped sweater, and large-brimmed hat swirling with ivory tulle suggested a pastoral bride. In between was a collection that would resonate with anyone who laments the death of clothes that emote (various versions of “She Moved Through the Fair,” a traditional Irish folk song, helped to cast a ghostly scene). “There’s a uniformity in garments today and I’m sure there are people who want to dream a bit more,” said designer Sébastien Meunier. “That’s the beauty of life—the possibility to dream.”
He cited both the Symbolist and Decadent movements from the latter half of the 19th century—from the eerie prints of artist Odilon Redon (spot the eye in the second look) to Joris-Karl Huysmans’s book Against Nature—as source material. While this predetermined an effective mix of period formality, moody flourish, and accessories featuring deer teeth (must wonder the sourcing there), it posed the inevitable costume conundrum: how to go out into the world without people thinking you’ve emerged from some fin de siècle wormhole.
Meunier underscored that a show environment inevitably dials up the drama; pare back some pleated layers, waistcoats, and headgear, and the silk jacquard jackets and linen pants skip several dozen decades to reach relevance. Note, too, the relaxed tailoring just a few shades shy of millennial pink. Most important, the garments were reconstructed in ways that would have been unfathomable circa 1880—from exposed linings to smocked-collar tops stopping just shy of the midriff. Compared to all the raw-edged cropped pants and flattering footwear, these pieces were novelties; yet the lace gloves and feminine deshabille aspect transferred to men was rather seductive. It may even have suggested high-concept decadence—bygone moral decay in the wake of contemporary gender fluidity.
