Looking at Joseph Altuzarra’s new collection, you’d never guess that it was technology he was thinking about. But that was precisely his point. Speaking before the show, he explained, “We were talking a lot about AI and when you can’t tell if something is real or not real.” Though it hardly needs saying, Altuzarra is very much on the side of the real, but this season he set out to experiment with surface details that tricked the eye and made you wonder. Like the florals on tops and dresses, which from the front looked like two-dimensional details, but then, as you examined them more closely, turned out to be 3D. Or, flipping the script, the “stole” that was actually an illustration of bird wings encircling a neckline.
Altuzarra likes conjuring that sense of the uncanny. He feels it resonates with the current world environment, but the dip into the surreal never disturbed the collection’s overall sense of prettiness. Silhouette-wise, he said he was thinking about “different time capsules,” including the ’40s and the ’80s. These references have been swirling in his work for the past several seasons, though here he pushed them somewhat further than he has before. Balloon pants, for instance. That silhouette is suddenly everywhere. Possibly, it’s the influence of Chemena Kamali’s Chloé, though Giorgio Armani seems to be a reference point too. Altuzarra was riffing along these lines at least three cycles ago, but here they came into full flower, the show’s only pants option.
Just how upside down is our world? Well, despite this being a spring season, Altuzarra showed a significant amount of faux fur, as did Alexander Wang at his show last night. The funnel-neck leather and suede jackets with the swing backs offered a strong counterpoint: sturdy, tough, and real, no question about it.
