Kim Jones lightens up Dior with star-studded debut
Designer Kim Jones brought a fresh new vision of streetwise couture to
Dior Homme in his celebrity-packed debut show for the fabled label at Paris
men’s fashion week Saturday.
With so many A-listers cram-packed in
the front row that Dior heiress Delphine Arnault and her billionaire
boyfriend Xavier Niel had to sit on the steps, old and new money rubbed
shoulders with rappers, the Beckham clan, Hollywood star Robert Pattinson,
Kate Moss and Naomi Campbell.
Aristocrat-turned-model Prince
Nikolai of Denmark led out a light and bright collection which seemed aimed
at draping the discerning millennial royal or plutocrat in effortless
cool.
The British creator who mixed class with street at Louis
Vuitton, where he hooked up with New York skatewear brand Supreme, had
insisted to AFP just before the show that he would take Christian Dior in
the opposite direction.
But his first show since taking over in
March was a clever mix of Dior’s high-end haute couture heritage with
Jones’ own gift for finely-honed casual chic.
And the big surprise
was a street-friendly new line of “C-D” logo buckles, buttons and rings
designed to send Instagram wild.
Pink elephant
Jones paid
a cheeky hommage to the brand’s founder Christian Dior by commissioning US
pop artist KAWS to make a 10-metre (33-feet) high statue of him in flowers
with his dog Bobby as the centrepiece of the show.
From afar the
monumental piece — made with 70,000 roses and peonies — looked like a
pink elephant in a suit until the last-minute reveal, with “Game of
Thrones” star Gwendoline Christine, Kelly Osbourne, South Korean actor Jung
Hae-in and Chinese star Huang Jingyu all straining to take selfies
underneath it.
KAWS — who Jones described as “the most important
artist in the world for the millennial generation” — also gave Dior’s
Napoleonic golden bee symbol a cartoony makeover.
As with many
Paris men’s shows this week, Jones brought a lighter, more feminine feel
with embroidered flowers adorning shirts, coats and bomber jackets, and
lots of light grey toile de Juoy and floral combinations that filtered
right down to the trainer boots.
Instagram swoons
The
38-year-old, one of fashion’s hottest talents, further blurred the gender
line with transparent shirts with amazingly delicate feather patterns
embroidered onto tulle and organza.
“Gender doesn’t matter any more
— it’s 2018,” Jones told AFP, who revived the delicate pinks, greys and
blues of the label’s early days. “But it is still menswear,” the designer
insisted. “In LA kids in the street wear pink all the time. So it’s not,
‘Oh it’s pink, I won’t wear it’, anymore,” he added.
Jones also
revived the one-button Dior double breasted suit — worn with basketball
boots and a natty cross between desert boots and trainers — and DB jackets
with a clever buttoned strap across the chest.
And nothing spoke
more of his flirtations between street and couture as his silk shirts with
a slashed cowl at the back, like the ghost of a hoodie.
One of the
first things Jones did after taking over in March was to sign up the
Korean-American jewellery designer Yoon Ahn of Ambush and fellow Briton
Matthew Williams (Alyx) to make a “C-D” logo for his buckles and
accessories.
Their creations — and key chains and necklaces
featuring KAWS’ new Dior bees — ran right through the collection and had
critics and Instagram swooning within minutes of the show ending at the
barracks of the Republican Guard cavalry regiment in the French
capital.
Clearly aware he was onto a winner, Jones plucked Yoon out
of the crowd at the end of the show to take the bow with him.(AFP)
Photos: SS19 Dior Homme, Catwalkpictures