Casey Cadwallader was feeling theatrical for fall. Fresh off the back of securing what will surely be the definitive red carpet viral hit of the year–Zendaya going couture robot in the “Maschinenmensch,” the fully articulated robotic armor suit from Mugler’s fall/winter 1995 couture collection, for the London premiere of Dune 2—he decided to embrace the overt showmanship that once earned Thierry Mugler the moniker “créateur de choc.” “I go to other people’s shows, and they’re very quiet. And when the show ends I’m like… I would die if it was this quiet!” said Cadwallader in a preview, showing the goose pimples to prove it. “I want people to smile, to laugh, to be turned on. There are brands that are about dressing you for the everyday, and I love those brands too, but I find myself at the helm of Mugler, and Mugler is different.”
Mugler sure is different—but so are the times. In an era of corporate, conglomerate-dominated fashion, what would it take for Cadwallader to stage, for instance, an epoch-defining extravaganza to rival that of the 20th-anniversary show in 1995 that spawned Maschinenmensch? Held at Paris’s Cirque d’Hiver, that show was an hour-long spectacle starring Jerry Hall, Naomi Campbell and Kate Moss, rounded off with a performance by James Brown. The robot suit alone took six months to make by hand.
Still, Cadwallader was determined to cause a commotion. “What a gift!” he said of the process of co-ordinating a three-act fashion show he’d dreamt up, complete with multiple curtain drops, Precious Lee and Paloma Elsesser silhouetted against a spotlight, Kristen McMenamy, Eva Herzigova and Farida Khelfa stalking the runway, and a whole heap of dry ice. “You get to have fun, you get to add drama and theater to what you’re doing. It’s more challenging but it makes you hone in on your idea.”
He’d been looking at the vampiric 1980s collections in the archive, eschewing daywear—no denim, no Lycra—for blood-pumping, pulse-racing evening looks. “I had a sporty flair in my clothes for many years at the beginning of [my time at] Mugler,” he said. “Now I really want a more glamorous, dressed-up, decadent, textural creation.” The first looks explored the idea of undressing, with sheer corsetry, molded leather armor, leather belts and liquid stretch-velvet unpeeling from the body. Then came experiments with print, a collaboration with the contemporary Canadian artist Ambera Wellmann, whose sexually-charged, surrealist paintings were adapted to adorn second-skin mini dresses and pants.
The final section went hell-for-leather—quite literally—on texture, including a fringed fabric over-embroidered with strips of leather to create a hair-like effect on a sheer mini dress; a plongé nappa leather that had been draped and pressed to create a super-soft, cocooning bomber jacket; and a woven patent-leather tweed shawl-jacket that swung as the model walked. As Farida waltzed past in a fire-engine-red fringed mini dress it was difficult to restrain a whoop—indeed, many of the audience, seated on bleachers, let out involuntary little screams.
As the models began their finale, the final curtain was pulled back to expose the backstage area, and the army of workers that pulls a show like this together. A sly nod to George Michael’s “Too Funky” video in 1992, a runway show directed by Mugler that contrasted the heaven on the catwalk and the hell backstage, it lent a human edge to the show—and elicited more rousing cheers. It seemed Cadwallader had achieved his stated aim: “I very much respect that Mugler is an outlier,” he said. “It’s not for everyone. Not everyone likes it. I don’t care. I just want the people who like it, to like it a lot. And for it to give them this charge.”
