Since starting his brand in 2018, Casablanca’s Charaf Tajer has played with the idea of the haut monde. Leisure is the privilege of the affluent, and his après sport concept combined with the idea of romance attached to the city signaled wealth and status. The fillip in this narrative was the way the designer played with ideas of masculine identity and gender fluidity. When Casa’s playboys started wearing pearls on the runway, for example, it wasn’t the trend it is today. And Tajer literally softened clothes, offering cashmere terry tracksuits and printed silk shirts.
The brand narrative started to change in 2020 with the extension into womenswear. On the whole, the Casablanca woman—well-groomed, icy, vaguely mysterious, and loaded—is less nuanced than her male counterpart. Actress Emma Mackey—the star of Le Monde Diplomatique, fall 2022’s collection film—certainly adds charm to the Casa woman’s résumé. And this season her wardrobe is more glamorous than it’s ever been, befitting Tajer’s theme.
“It’s the first collection that we do about Paris; specifically about Paris at the end of the nineties. The era of the Concorde and Lady Diana, and Dodi Al Fayed at the Ritz, and all the world of Jacques Chirac, the former French president who was so iconic,” the designer explained over Zoom. “I grew up in this era… And it stays with me, so I wanted to dedicate this winter collection to this moment.” One of the ways he did so was adding couture touches in the form of intricately beaded pieces. These really soar and also build on the brand’s signature printed pieces. A more-clean-lined use of sparkling embroidery on a bolero tuxedo (look 67) draws the eye as well.
Also referencing haute couture are this season’s feathered looks, including a winter white cape and a blue swan minidress. The swan—“beautiful but mean, like Paris”—Tajer jokes, is the animal of the season. The film makes a connection between the gracefulness of this bird to that of the Concorde. The plane’s clean, triangular shape also inspired an abstract print in Gallic red, white, and blue.
Grounded in 2003, the supersonic Concorde could make the trip between Paris and New York in about half the time of a regular jetliner and remains a symbol of glamour. It was the preferred form of transport for supermodels, moguls, and the occasional fraudster. Christophe Rocancourt, a French con artist, who according to a 2002 interview took “cross-Atlantic jaunts on the Concorde ‘like packing a daily lunch,’” has a cameo in the movie. The film was shot, in part, at the Musée de l’Air et de l’Espace outside of Paris.
Travel is a recurring Casa theme: “It’s really in the center of the conversation for us, discovering new places and exchanging art and design movements,” Tajer notes. With new COVID variants making travel still unpredictable, his instinct to romanticize the idea of flight is on point, however the collection is at times too much in thrall to the theme.
A life vest-inspired puffer and a collaboration with Globetrotter are looks that fly. In contrast, despite their sharp tailoring, many of the flight attendant-inspired pieces feel stiff and retro. Similar silhouettes work better when translated into knits and zippered track suit-style jackets. The same is the case with the envelope details (a nod to hotel stationery, perhaps particularly that designated par avion), which make for lovely pockets, but look stifling and forced on a crested, high-necked evening cape. Keeping things more down to earth are the brand’s new curvy sneakers.
It’s a challenge not to get carried away by Paris. “I think when you grow up in Paris you have certain codes that stay with you, and the whole challenge was to not fall into caricature,” Tajer said. As the designer was mining his own youthful memories this season, another hurdle was to avoid nostalgia, but it wasn’t always cleared. Generally speaking, fashion’s take on future looks tends towards the retro, as it did here at times.
Casablanca first made a mark by challenging, expanding, and softening codes, materially and otherwise, relating to Parisian style, gender, and diversity. Tajer has shown us that quality doesn’t need to be stiff, nor stuffy. The best pieces in this collection aren’t all casual, but they combine comfort and chic in a way that reflects how we live today.
