"Salva Venezia" (Save Venice) read the plea on the Magic Mike-esque, extremely briefs that were the faintest of underline south of a crop top and turban in the first look. By framing this collection around Venice, Dame Vivienne Westwood and Andreas Kronthaler hit upon a rare accord between clothes presented and campaign agitated for. "It is to do with climate change, of course," Kronthaler explained backstage: "Venice is one of the greatest things we have as an urban space." And that city is, of course, at risk from irresponsibility-induced high tide. Photo-printed palazzo separates, a five-layer pentimento-painted romper costume, and a series of loose-knit medieval hovel tunics cast a true-ish, if sometimes unflattering, light on this theme.
You could stretch the point and say that the typically wicked tailored looks that followed were an update, a look at the tailored 10 percenters who stalk the Arsenale during the biennale. But they were just great Westwood suits (ah, the irony of a designer who so detests the system but is one of the best exponents of its uniform). "This was quite a sexy collection too," Kronthaler said. There were certainly signifiers of sex, which came repackaged and subverted, notably the tit-tote chest bag. And if you like pants that fall to your ankles if you don t hold on to them, there were plenty of those too. It wasn t the most desirable Westwood men s collection, for sure, yet some boats will be floated.
