Around the World

April 6, 2018 / by Philippe Dova

When Lydia Courteille created her brand in 1987, she initially focused on antique jewellery. After collecting and selling some 7,000 vintage pieces, she turned her hand to jewellery design. For more than 30 years, her haute joaillerie collections – each piece unique and quietly provocative – have been displayed with theatrical flair in her shop on the Rue Saint-Honoré in Paris. She counts global celebrities among her fans, including Madonna, Karl Lagerfeld and Nicole Kidman.

So how often do you introduce a new collection? 

I create a collection with a new theme every six months. Each one comprises around 30 unique pieces. 

Your Rosa del Inca collection, presented last January at the haute joaillerie event of Paris Fashion Week, was your 57th. Where do you get your boundless inspiration? 

Travel inspires me enormously. This collection is a tribute to rhodochrosite, the national stone of Argentina, which I discovered during a trip there; the Argentines call it Rosa del Inca. I was inspired by the different civilisations that have left their mark on the country’s history – the Mapuche, the Inca and, much later, the Spanish. The history, the folklore, the colours, the fabrics, the animals and the plants that I discover during my travels are inexhaustible sources of inspiration.

My previous collection, Un Automne à Pékin, was inspired by my visit to the Forbidden City when I was in the Chinese capital for an exhibition at Lane Crawford. There are lots of feng shui references, with grasshoppers, frogs, dragons and fish – animals that symbolise luck, wealth, prosperity and longevity. 

The colours of your designs are very soft and harmonious. 

That’s the intention of every collection, the source of its beauty. All the objects reinforce one another. There has to be a consistency in the colours and the shapes. It mustn’t be monotonous. It’s about creating a harmonious whole and that isn’t necessarily easy to achieve. When I start to design a piece, I first have to find the stones, then decide the subject, then the colours that I’ll be adding to create the finished work. Lastly, it has to tell a story and spark desire. 

Fringe Binge

April 6, 2018 / by China Daily Lifestyle Premium

Tracking the Trends

March 2, 2018 / by China Daily Lifestyle Premium

Bling Thing

Start with a glittery dress, or take the look head-to-toe – just remember, there’s a fine line between ostentatious and glamorous. The style can be enhanced with a matching sparkling ensemble (as at Mary Katrantzou) or more subtle when paired with a monochrome top (Molly Goddard).

Artistic Touch

This season, stay inspired by the canvas. Luxury powerhouses such as Prada and Versace are spicing up pieces with their odes to the arts – be it graffiti, pop art, collage or even watercolours, as seen at Céline.

Utilitarian Chic 

Shorts are essential for warmer weather, but you’d better make sure they’re practical – with belts and multiple pockets. With a focus on neutrals and comfortable materials, they’re probably not going to be the standouts of your ensemble, but they’ll probably match every outfit.

Fringe Fever

It’s time to get a little frivolous. This season, long fringe has been spotted flowing all over – on shoulders, waists and legs. When accompanied by feathers and coloured threads, it harks back to the 1920s flapper era and makes a great party look today.

Country Garden

For a perfect spring outfit, florals are always in. Abandon all those over-the-top flower patterns, though; instead, opt for subtle micro-prints and pastel shades. In essence, go as natural as possible. 

Plastic Fantastic

March 2, 2018 / by China Daily Lifestyle Premium

Image above: Three models wearing waterproof coats, circa 1965

Andy Warhol once famously said of the denizens of Los Angeles: “They’re beautiful. Everybody’s plastic – but I love plastic. I want to be plastic.” The fashion world definitely agrees with these magical polymers this year – the cool, shiny, futuristic material. 

The use of plastic in fashion started around the 1920s, when a range of colours were introduced to Bakelite, an early synthetic plastic that was developed in 1907 for mass production purposes; famed fashion designer Coco Chanel created jewellery in Bakelite. Her rival of the time, Elsa Schiaparelli, also applied this material to buttons. Polyvinyl chloride, or PVC, was plasticised in 1926. The shiny plastic-coated fabric of polyester looks like patent leather, but it’s glossier and even cheaper, making for a great substitute.

The wild 1960s ushered in a new era of embracing boldness, energy and contrasting beauty; this happened alongside the rise of pop art and the youth fashion movement. Mary Quant, the Welsh fashion designer and style icon of the period, rose to fame with her miniskirts, pinafore dresses and shiny, plastic raincoats – her bright colourways and dynamic prints still make for a mischievously chic expression today. 

The comeback of plastic in fashion raged back in earnest last year, spotted on a range of designs from street fashion to luxury brands. Calvin Klein’s autumn 2017 ready-to-wear collection introduced a number of plastic-covered jackets for both men and women, as well as dresses; the translucent material reminds one of a plastic sofa cover – what’s underneath
ranges from a plaid wool jacket or a sheer silk dress to a dyed fur coat. Yeezy, Kanye West’s footwear brand, introduced a pair of thigh-high boots in entirely transparent PVC as part of its Season Four collection. 

Wonder what haute rainwear looks like? Check out Karl Lagerfeld’s spring 2018 runway show for Chanel – it was held in the Grand Palais in Paris with a waterfall as the backdrop. The luxury brand interpreted waterproof fashion in a very Chanel way, such as styling the classic tweed jacket with a variety of clear PVC accessories, including bucket hats, raincoats, rain capes, gloves, boots and handbags.

Cute as a Button

March 2, 2018 / by Marine Orlova

You don’t seem to take much notice of these items until they’re missing. But how many shirts and coats sit for months in dark closets because of a lost button? Although they’re indispensable, buttons probably don’t seem like the most exciting part of a garment. 

Yet there was a time when they were precious accessories and symbols of social status. Buttons only became affordable with the advent of the Industrial Revolution, when mass production gave birth to the iconic four-hole model. But during the Middle Ages, they were made with gold and remained the privilege of the wealthy; numerous buttons on a jacket meant plenty of money in the pockets. Buttons reached the peak of popularity during the 18th century, when King Louis XIV of France made them most fashionable. He (and, subsequently, all the courtiers) donned jewel-like buttons made with a variety of precious stones, or adorned with highly sophisticated miniature paintings – these buttons often cost more than the whole outfit. 

In her vibrant Parisian haberdashery, Brigitte Renaud has amassed a unique collection of buttons from the late 19th and 20th centuries. Carefully arranged by colour, material and style, they look like so many candies. “The buttons say a lot about the origin and the time of clothes,” says Renaud. “They’re precious testimonies of the technical advances and the artistic movements of an era. For example, the buttons from the ’30s were often made with newly invented plastics such as Bakelite, Galalite or Lucite, and were infused with art deco patterns.”

Hovering at the junction of art and design, did you know that artists such as Alberto Giacometti, Fernand Léger, Sonia Delaunay and Pablo Picasso created buttons? Between the two World Wars, renowned Italian fashion designer Elsa Schiaparelli made innovative and arty buttons her trademark. “She worked with Lucien Weingott, a peculiar artist who created buttons in his kitchen with all kinds of natural materials: seeds, nut shells, resins,” explains Renaud. 

Classic Contrast

March 2, 2018 / by China Daily Lifestyle Premium

Double Happiness

March 2, 2018 / by Olivia James

Some people say sustainable fashion can only comes when we change the business model – when profit doesn’t drive everything. 

We want to change the model. We’re a big business, but we want to move into circularity, and the vision is to lead that change towards circular and renewable fashion. Yes, we think that’s kind of a ballsy vision – as it should be. We know people will always love fashion; I love fashion. But we want to know that what we consume is good. Moving into circularity is because we know resources are scarce and we can’t go on using things in the same way we have for the last 30 years. Circularity is both our mantra and our vision, so we can continue to make new fashion out of the old. And we do have some tough goals – by 2030, all the fabrics we create will be from sustainable sources. 

How tough is that to achieve? 

It’s quite tough, because we don’t have those fabrics yet today. We have organic cotton and we have recycled polyester, but there’s only so much you can do with these fabrics. For a smaller range, we have our Conscious Exclusive collection, which is limited. In that, we try out new sustainable fabrics, which hopefully can be scaled up and applied to more of our collections, but there are challenges. 

What are those challenges? 

Well, there are new fabrics on the market, like grape leather, for example, but the quantity is just so small. So the crucial part is scaling up for us. But we also invest in a lot of different companies and work with scientists. Here, we work with the Hong Kong Research Institute for Textiles and Apparel (HKRITA). The non-profit H&M Foundation did a collaboration with HKRITA; together we have – or they have – come up with a groundbreaking innovation, which is how to recycle blended fabrics. Recycling up to now has been mechanically made, where materials are ripped apart into separate ones. But with this innovation, we can recycle blended materials without any quality loss. For us, that’s really exciting, and also scalable on a larger and more practical level. This applies to all fashion businesses, not just H&M. That will be interesting to watch. The CEO of HKRITA, Edwin Keh, is someone you should talk to – he’s scientific and also really candid about the challenges. 

Do you think people’s clothing labels will one day proclaim: “Made in such and such a laboratory”? 

Maybe! We want to be as transparent as possible – to say this product is grown from this, or to identify a waste product that has been used. Like grape leather, for example – the leftovers from the wine industry. So now we all have to start drinking more wine! There’s something called orange fibre from the citrus peel, which could become something new. 

On the topic of scale, you mentioned grape debris. How much of that is needed to make one bag? 

It’s very hard to say with grape debris. The only thing I know is that we do Conscious Exclusives once per year. Last year [in April] we had a dress made from bionic yarn, which comes from plastic waste gathered from the shorelines of China. I can tell you that 89 plastic bottles went into that one dress. And it was really beautiful, too. It’s a good concrete example of this whole process. 

What challenges are there that you feel consumers don’t understand about the sustainability debate? 

For us, it’s still a question of making fashion that people want to wear. We have to be able to merge the two worlds even better – to make sustainability fashionable and fashion sustainable. That’s the challenge and that’s what Conscious Exclusive is about. We can make really beautiful clothes today using sustainable fabrics and make it all fashionable, because making sustainable clothes just for the sake of sustainability, without making them fashionable, makes no sense. That’s also not sustainable. 

How much thought is given to how recyclable a collection is at the end of its life cycle? 

To be honest, not enough – we’re not there yet. Again, it’s the marriage of sustainability and fashion. Everybody working at H&M, every designer, knows that we get opportunities and they know our values; they know the fabrics they can choose from. But I wish we could do more – and we have to, especially with 2030 in mind. Though now, with recycling and scientific breakthroughs like recycling-blended fabrics, it has become a bit easier. 

What happens to fast fashion when sustainability catches up? 

You know, we don’t like this term,“fast fashion”. But I met a professor in England who was thinking of extending the idea further in this way – what if we want to buy a top for going out on Saturday night; could we make it disposable? For example, after you wear it, it disappears, breaks down into cells or fibres, and can be recycled in a new way. You enjoy the party top, then it fades. That changes people’s reaction to “fast fashion” – from something intrinsically bad to something very progressive. We all love new things, we want new things, and this is a way to find novelty and turn that into something positive. We want to do good. That’s also why we want to be on top of change and lead. 

Go Luxe or Save Bucks

January 26, 2018 / by China Daily Lifestyle Premium

Pride and Passion

January 26, 2018 / by China Daily Lifestyle Premium

image above: Guo Pei

Born and raised in the 1960s in Beijing, Guo Pei is the most renowned Chinese designer in haute couture. In 2015, when Rihanna wore Guo’s imperial yellow cape gown to the annual Met Gala in New York (the theme that year was “China: Through the Looking Glass”), the designer’s name and fame went truly international – but she didn’t know who Rihanna was when the pop singer approached her for a dress. 

The voluminous gown, dubbed the “dragon robe” on Chinese social media, is now on display at the designer’s solo exhibition Guo Pei: Couture Beyond, being held until March 4 at SCAD FASH Museum of Fashion + Film in Atlanta. The dress – featuring a 16-foot train and weighing 25kg – epitomises Guo’s laborious production methods. Also known as “magnificent gold” (or da jin in Putonghua), it was the designer’s first haute couture masterpiece and her most important one. The dress features real gold threads and fine embroidery, and took her team of nearly 500 artisans some 50,000 hours to make. 

How did Guo rise to the top of Chinese haute couture? In 1986, she graduated from the Beijing Second Light Industry School as one of the country’s earliest students to major in fashion design – just nine years after the national university entrance exam resumed in 1977. Guo grew up during the Cultural Revolution, an era of hardship when any adornment and individualism was strictly prohibited, and she wore only neutral-coloured and plain garments. But she was determined to become one of China’s first fashion designers. 

Spring 2018 Couture

A Step Up

January 26, 2018 / by China Daily Lifestyle Premium

Manolo Blahnik once said, “You put high heels on – and you change.” In modern times, glamorous sky-high heels may be of little practicality, but dating back to the 10th century, they were essential accessories for men in battle in the Near East. 

Shoes with heels are widely considered to have originated from the Persian Empire. Cavalry in the region wore heeled boots to stay mounted on their horses; with the heels providing a crucial security measure, the arrow-shooting riders could stand in the stirrups while the horses galloped. Later, these practical riding boots transformed into cowboy boots in the US. 

In Europe during the Middle Ages, pattens were heeled overshoes that both men and women would slip on before heading out. The heels, which were usually wooden-soled, could elevate the foot above the grime at street level – as sewage systems and water pipes weren’t a feature of medieval towns, it was common to throw garbage and human waste into the streets. In the 15th century, leather pattens became fashionable and in London, a wealth of new styles emerged including multi-layered leather soles, ones with narrow, elongated toes, and shoes that could be worn over hosiery. 

Similar to pattens, chopines were also platform shoes, but worn exclusively by women. Believed to have been created in 15th-century Turkey, chopines were adopted by the Venetians from the 15th to 18th century, and were popularly worn by courtesans and patricians.

These ultra-high heels – which could rise up to some 75cm above the ground – were deemed a representation of prestige and the fragility of woman. But the inconvenience of chopines sparked rumours that they had been invented by men who wanted to prevent their wives from engaging in illicit affairs by making it difficult to walk. Chopines were lavishly embellished, with beautiful decorations such as embroidery, gold lace and leatherwork, forever linking high heels with the feminine aesthetic.