Who — or what — creates the female form: the woman herself or the designer who's dressing her? Hussein Chalayan toyed with that idea in his Spring 2013 collection, showing looks that were alternately boxed in, formfitting, or had the shape of a woman's body literally drawn on.
The foundation here was Chalayan's customarily sharp stable of basics, rendered this season in fabrics that were for the most part light in color and in weight. Two boxy coat dresses opened the show (one with sleeves, one without), followed immediately by square shirts and culottes. The pieces that followed — mostly shirts and skirts, some adorned with ruffles and pleats — sucked the waist back in and gave their wearers shape for a time, then came rectangular dresses with column shapes that either had an hourglass figure gently colored on or sheer rectangular shapes over printed dresses that hugged the body. All Chalayan's customers will have to do is decide which method for showing off or concealing their assets works for them.
>> Hussein Chalayan has opted out of showing his Spring 2011 collection on the Paris runways; instead, he will present his collection to press and buyers individually. The conceptual designer has been busy showing two film installations in London galleries and says of his choice of film over runway this season: "There is always this performative element to my work, and film for me has been quite a natural medium. You can orchestrate the way the elements in a film connect, in terms of the choreography, the lights, the sound. In a way, it's what you ultimately do in a runway show, but obviously that's live and things go wrong. There's another beauty in that, but film was a natural progression for me." [
All eyes on Paris
>> Just as his
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