Yohji Yamamoto
PARIS, October 2, 2005
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"I wanted to play with the history of fashion," said Yohji Yamamoto backstage after his spring show. "With the history of the earth, from dinosaurs to humans." If anyone's up to the task of condensing all of recorded history into a minutes-long show, it's this uniquely inventive designer.The collection was divided into several different sections marked by interludes of musical extremes, from piano solos to Iggy Pop. But one unifying theme was that nearly all of the looks featured something oversize, exaggerated, or otherwise blown out of proportion. Take, for example, the train of a black coat, complete with jagged, cut-out fabric ridges and a pair of horns, borrowing the identifying markings of a triceratops tail. Whimsical? Yes. A showpiece? Definitely. However, this artful outing wasn't without its wearable pieces.
Yamamoto started by tweaking the traditional elements of the tuxedo, enlarging the cuffs and collars, and pairing tails with overalls or jeans. A camouflage material offset more-feminine silhouettes, like a wrap dress with ear-grazing ruffled shoulders and a floor-length bustled skirt. Color came in the way of a royal-blue tailored jacket with blousy pockets of navy velvet and a below-the-knee skirt to match, or a ribbon-tied brown apron worn on one side of the body atop an all-black ensemble, but it didn't stop with the clothes. Hair stylist Eugene Souleiman arranged rectangular swags in shades from platinum to raven along the models' eyebrows.
Evening looks were more fantastical. It isn't entirely clear what coiled lengths of rope and industrial tubing have to do with those backstage talking points, but audience members didn't mind. When Lily Cole walked down the aisle in a wedding gown with a ball skirt bustling in every direction, atop a rope ring and a corsage of braided tubes, they responded with a cheer.
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