The Tamesis
Four months after staging his first womenswear show for Balenciaga, Pierpaolo Piccioli has a larger agenda for Demna’s recently vacated fashion house, which can now be read in expanded form. Set against the backdrop of a luxurious concept home gym and on the streets of Paris, this is it: “Combining technical clothing with haute couture is key to this collection,” he said. “Both for women and men.”
All creative directors who have recently jumped into the driving seat of a major luxury fashion brand face the tricky task of deciding how quickly to move forward without leaving existing customers in the dust. “I don’t believe streetwear is dead,” Piccioli declared. He just has a different take on classic hoodies and giant sneakers than Demna, who calls Balenciaga their home. “I feel like Balenciaga is about the realities of modern life. From the beginning, I said I wanted to put humans – the body – at the center of this project, but I did it here in a new way. Because for me, Balenciaga DNA is all about innovation.”
By “techwear,” Piccioli means skin-tight stretch bodysuits and leggings, as well as reinventions of the instantly recognizable Balenciaga sneaker silhouette. They are now so light that they can “run and move”. In a world of dazzling merchandise, he believes every item needs to prove its worth. “These are technical garments that are made for performance, not just decoration. They are made to make the body move. It’s not just an abstract idea about fashion.”
For the designer with long experience in Valentino haute couture, rethinking the cocoon-like cuts and volumes of Cristobal Balenciaga’s creations has become second nature. “It’s about preserving codes and giving them different meanings,” he observed. “I’m here because of the people who have been here before. I don’t want to deny that.”
Balenciaga history buffs will note that this men’s camel coat (which Piccioli calls a “square cut”) is based on an existing coat from the archives that Cristobal had tailor-made for himself. Off-the-shoulder necklines in leather jackets and sinuous dresses, right down to the pompadours on the back of men’s bomber jackets, are references, as are luxe trailing cape gowns (however, modernized in jersey, it’s as easy to throw on as a T-shirt, he promises.)
Perhaps most talked about, though, is the resurgence of the tall cycling helmet from 20 years ago, which Nicolas Ghesquière caused a stir with at the spring 2006 Balenciaga show. Piccioli said his own version, which is more like a baseball cap paired with a “cagoule” or a sculpted scarf, is intended to cross over with streetwear concepts.
Like Demna, Piccioli used his own social observations of how people dress and mix and match today. He knows to dress from the inside out for glamorous occasions (lots of sequins, most of them hanging on the subway). There are also collaborations: one with Manolo Blahnik and another with the NBA. The latter fell today.
