Beethoven s 7th on the soundtrack, marble cited as an inspiration in the show notes, a pattern of watery ripples spreading across a coat, a top…put all of that together and one might justifiably assume Raf Simons had looked to Venice as inspiration for his latest Jil Sander collection. But despite a somber, monumental air to the clothes, "fragmentation" was in fact Simons mot du jour. The way that marble and stone crack over time into veiny fragments offered the designer a golden (or maybe granite) opportunity to inject a graphic element into a collection that has previously been distinguished by its monochromatic purity. At the same time, it gave him a chance to make a statement about the way that fashion s past, present, and future are endlessly de- and re-constructed. If his concept wasn t entirely successful, it s possibly because there was so much marbling—in coats and suits with matching totes and turtlenecks, and a fuzzy mohair for good measure. It felt oddly retro, like a splash-dash New Wave moment. The eighties effect was compounded by a silhouette that pumped up the volume on top and trimmed the leg away to a leotard slimness, ending in a shoe of a creeperlike chunk. (On the evidence of Milan s first day, early adopters are forecasting such bulk as the foot of the future.)
The swell of Angelo Badalamenti s music for Mulholland Drive offered a better index of Simons true gift. In a David Lynch-ian "Nothing is quite what it seems" way, the graphic texture of a coat suggested beading when it was actually tweed, and a pleating effect—sometimes horizontal, sometimes vertical—loaned a new definition to the body s movement. Simons really thinks about clothes, for which we can be eternally grateful. And he gives us more reason to be thankful when what he s thinking about gels with what we d want to wear, as in a suit with a dull but seductive metallic gleam.
