Julia Fox is a hit with revenge dress after breaking up with Kanye West

The New York Times

Celebrities flaunting their elegance at a fashion show isn’t exactly uncommon these days, when President Biden’s granddaughters attend the Markarian show and diverse members of the “Euphoria” cast seem to be ubiquitous.

The reciprocal exchange of favors that characterizes the relationship between fame and fashion is an open secret. But even under such cynical criteria, the first model in LaQuan Smith’s show, held at 9pm on Feb. [o Dia dos Namorados nos Estados Unidos]caused some fuss.

There was Julia Fox, who recently broke up with Kanye West, flaunting her skills in a skin-tight, high-necked tube dress with a trio of generous slits around her chest, an inverted T-shaped sash of fabric arranged suggestively to draw eyes to the revealing details, her hair pulled back in a tight bun, an insinuating sway of her hips, and a “hey goofy, look what you’re missing” expression plastered on her face. (The stylist said he has known Fox’s work since he was in high school, according to a spokesperson, and that he thought she would be the perfect woman to represent the spirit of the collection.)

Fox’s entry took the revenge dress concept and took it to the next level. And it offered a good example of the practical applications of a fad that might seem impractical.

Smith creates sharp biker jackets and clean-line overcoats, but his specialty is the vernacular of boldness and exposure: sequined legs; curves almost escaping the fabric; showy jewelry, signaling. These sorts of things are easy to overlook, but as Fox demonstrated at the show, they certainly have their uses.

And her entrance also served to inject some energy into what had been a rather low-key fashion week. The exuberance that permeated last season, fueled by a palpable sense that the city was emerging, and that fashion’s role in it was being reclaimed, has dissipated.

Mayor Eric Adams, one of the most fashion-conscious politicians and someone who presumably has a keen interest in the success of one of New York’s most important economic sectors, was unable to attend. Instead of contemplating the outside world, many designers seem to have opted for introspection.

In the best cases, this can create a sense of intimacy, as happened at the show by Maryam Nassir Zadeh, who likes to pile layers of fashion clichés like a schoolgirl sweater over a leather skirt over sheer pants, and whose events often create the feeling of a family reunion among insiders.

This time, writer Ottessa Moshfegh (who wrote a short story for the Proenza Schouler show earlier this week and is starting to become something of a fashion muse) walked the runway wearing a gray, knee-length desk-style skirt. , and a black leather scarf, while stylists Mike Eckhaus and Zoe Latta of Eckhaus Latta applauded from the audience.

But when Tory Burch held her show in a glass-walled building in Midtown, with seemingly all of New York City lit up and stretched out below, which included a fluorescent sign over a neighboring building that read “New Yorkers [símbolo de coração] Tory”, the moment was one of the rare – and timely – reminders that there is still a world out there.

And that gave her clothes, which are becoming more and more interesting, with hints of mid-20th century elegance and 1970s shadows, and her geometric color coordination (a blue and red beaded T-shirt over a turquoise turtleneck blouse and black arms, paired with a lurex skirt and bounded by a black leather belt), a firm foundation in the power structure in which they are supposed to be worn.

This element was not present in Carolina Herrera’s show, held in a denatured white box in which stylist Wes Gordon displayed his rainbow of dresses, jumpsuits decorated with rhinestones, tulle cocktail sets, and flowery models, such as a bouquet of formal beauty looking for a gala party.

Nor was he present at the Coach show, where Stuart Vevers built “a city somewhere in America,” according to the “local community bulletin” left at each seat. “A city where it’s always time to shine”, read the text, where “love is in the air”, and where “anything is possible”.

The idea is a good one, but in practice the city seemed to exist in a kind of haunted suburb, represented by three lonely wooden houses, a parked car and a basketball hoop affixed to a garage door, and populated by mostly citizens. dressed as if to revive grunge, in checkered clothes and thick coats, t-shirts with designs, velvet, baby-doll dresses and graffiti pieces. Using, in other words, the costumes of alienated and distressed young people, but which in the context should represent optimistic nostalgia and hope.

The parade made no sense. The 1990s is one of the big trends of the moment in part because the vague, indistinct anxiety of that era feels all too familiar at the moment. Vevers did very well on the first part of the proposal, but failed to carry out the second. This left a big gap between the clothes and the content. And the celebrities (including Megan Thee Stallion) and TikTok video creators who filled the audience were unable to fill it.