33 posts tagged "Rodarte"
The Nails That Were Built With 200 (Wo)man Hours
As we stagger through day six of New York fashion week, the nude nail—or no nail—movement is gaining steam with each passing show. But that hasn’t stopped the industry’s nail artists from flexing their creative muscles. Michelle Huynh’s spiel at Rodarte yesterday started much like many similar spiels have gone since the weekend. “We created a base with two coats of Frosting Cream and Desert Suede, which we followed with a glossy topcoat,” the CND manicurist began. But it ended quite differently. “Then we mixed those two colors with Chocolate Milk, painted a piece of wax paper, let it dry, and topped that with a matte topcoat,” she continued—at which point our ears perked up. “We cut the paper into strips,” she explained, demonstrating how the microscopic slivers were then crisscrossed on top of the nail and glued down by another coat of the band’s Super Shiny Topcoat, which was slicked on underneath the paper pieces, not on top of them, so there was a “glimmer” from the different textures playing off one another when models walked down the runway. Not your average nude nail, to be sure.
More Dungeons & Dragons, Less Kim Kardashian, Backstage At Rodarte
“A modern-medieval face” is what the tip sheet James Kaliardos was passing around to his team backstage at Rodarte said, but there was more to it than that, of course. “The collection feels Dungeons & Dragons to me, not Joan of Arc,” Kaliardos elaborated, referencing the austerity of old religious paintings and “getting rid of the Kim Kardashian look—forever.”
That meant skipping those familiar, heavily bronzed contours and focusing instead on a paled-out complexion that was treated with NARS Skin Optimal Brightening Concentrate and a light-handed application of its Sheer Glow Foundation just in the center of the face, “because once it gets on the cheeks, it actually looks like foundation,” according to Kaliardos. There wasn’t much visible product on the face at all, really, save for NARS’ Triple X Lip Gloss, which was swathed onto mouths and eyelids and applied through girls’ brows as well, including show-opener Jessica Stam’s. “Can you fix me,” Stam beseeched Kaliardos, who added a little fullness, too, at the model’s request.
Odile Gilbert was working off the proportions of Kate and Laura Mulleavy’s designs. “When they showed me the clothes, I thought [the girls] needed something long,” Gilbert said, referring to the hair, which she made “strict and straight” to accommodate a dragon earring cuff clipped onto models’ left ears. “It’s like the girls are shaved,” she explained, slicking strands with Kérastase Ciment Thermique for a pre-blow-dry polish, and dividing them into three sections: two in back—one hanging straight down over the other—and one in front, which was combed all the way over to one side and coated with its Elixir Ultime for added shine.
The finishing touch came from the most conceptual neutral nail we’ve seen this week. “It took 200 man-hours,” CND manicurist Michelle Huynh said of the three-dimensional polish-on-polish basketweave tips that showcased a blended base of its varnishes in Desert Suede and Frosting Cream. Nude, it turns out, doesn’t necessarily mean boring.
Giovanna Gets a Gold Star
When I first eyed the gold star hair clips Laura and Kate Mulleavy designed for their Australian Outback, dust storm-inspired Fall Rodarte show, I believe my exact words were, “Need. Want.” (A message that was delivered via Instagram, of course). While I later learned that the barrettes would not make it onto retail counters, Giovanna Battaglia managed to get her hands on one for last night’s Marc Jacobs-sponsored Art Production Fund Urban Hoedown. Three months on and I’m still thinking the same thing: Need. Want. Thoughts on the clip’s first off-the-runway cameo?
Update: Due to overwhelming response, the clips will be produced—and will be available this summer at www.paire.us.
Down Under Stunners, Backstage At Rodarte
Before setting up his station with bottles of NARS Sheer Glow Foundation and a multitude of its bronzer and blush compacts backstage at Rodarte, James Kaliardos broke out the skincare. “Everyone’s skin is just disastrous right now,” the face painter proclaimed, soaking cotton pads with NARS’ new Makeup Cleansing Water and then slathering on “pretty much everything” from the brand’s skincare line to remedy models’ dry complexions—the unhappy result of four full days of shows. Once Kaliardos did start in with the makeup, though, there was no stopping him.
“These girls are in the Australian Outback and they’ve been caught in a dust storm,” he said, explaining Laura and Kate Mulleavy’s inspiration for their Fall collection, which manifested itself as a blend of bronze and pink pigments that Kaliardos applied with a heavy hand onto cheeks and lids. “I didn’t want it to be all bronzer and J. Lo,” he insisted; instead, the makeup artist opted for “Faye Dunaway cheeks,” which he sculpted by brushing on layer after layer of NARS Bronzer in Laguna. The shimmering insta-tan also made an appearance on lids, where it was brushed through the brows in the shape of an “arc.” Next Kaliardos dusted NARS Blush in Gaiety, a pure pink, from the crease toward the outer corners of eyes and then dotted its Blush in Madly onto the apples of cheeks, “geisha-style.” To open the eyes a bit, he pressed the white shade from NARS’ Eyeshadow Duo in Vent Glace into the inner corners. Lips were painted an opaque pink with its Velvet Matte Lip Pencil in Bolero. If the makeup looked heavy, that was intentional. “More!” Kaliardos instructed his team. “Stronger!”
Hairstylist Odile Gilbert worked off a similar directive, re-creating a down under dust storm effect by varying the texture in her side-parted faux bobs. Prepping hair with Kérastase Mousse Volumactive, Gilbert created a shorter, curly side of the style, which she adorned with a series of gold pins, some of which had stars on them, and a longer, smoother side that went sans accessories. So how did Gilbert determine which girls got gold stars? “They decided,” she said of the designers. “They decide everything. They know what they want.”
Fine Art Meets Teenage Dreams, Backstage At Rodarte
If it wasn’t clear from the sunflower-print opening looks that Laura and Kate Mulleavy sent out onto the runway, Vincent van Gogh and his most famous works partially inspired their Spring Rodarte collection and its complementary beauty look. “It’s Starry Night,” makeup artist James Kaliardos said backstage, referencing the Dutch post-impressionist master’s oil-on-canvas depiction of the view outside his sanitarium room window. “Bigger! Smokier!” Kaliardos told his army of face painters, who encased eyes in midnight blue accordingly, thanks to a precise layering effort of NARS’ new Soft Touch Shadow Pencil in Dark Rite, a shimmering navy, and its Eye Shadows in Night Flight, a deep ink, and Tropic, a glittery aqua. Cheeks were treated to a blended application of NARS Cream Blush in Penny Lane, a muted mauve that was also patted onto lips and topped with its Lip Gloss in Nano, a sheer purple, for a lavender-tinged nude effect.
The famous painting’s swirling stars and dark backdrop inspired nail guru Deborah Lippmann as well, who custom-mixed large pieces of silver and graphite sequins into her sparkling navy lacquer Lady Sings the Blues. “You’ve gotta amp it up for the girls,” Lippmann said, referring to the Mulleavys, who are particular about every single detail that goes into their shows, right down to the toes. “They didn’t want them to match the nail,” Lippmann mentioned, slicking on pedicures with two coats of her universal neutral varnish Fashion.
Odile Gilbert diverted from the art-history reference to add a retro forties element to the equation in the form of “sweet sixteen” hair that worked well with the designers’ series of fantasy, almost promlike dresses. “It’s sort of teenager-y,” Gilbert said, scrunching in Kérastase Volumactive Conditioning Mousse and its Double Force Hairspray for a tiny bit of texture. It wasn’t all youth and whimsy, though—the front row’s mean age not withstanding. Gilbert side-parted strands and then created a twisted wave that she secured with a hair comb. “That’s the part that’s sophisticated,” she said.