Credit: Vogue.com
This was like a sophisticated haven for polka dots. Gigantic, almost cartoonish polka dots. Marc had them over everything. And it was awesome. Marc is truly amazing at reinterpreting historical fashion movements into his own. For Fall 2011, the wild and free-volumed seventies of Spring went out the window. It was all structure and discipline à la Dior’s New Look silhouette. In fact, this followed the vein of his typical collection for Louis Vuitton: heightened sense of luxury and glamour but with a heavy dose of playfulness. That’s very Marc actually. He essentially established a tongue-in-cheek almost cartoonish vision of femininity. I love how he manages to make strict tailoring (that doesn’t explicitly mold to the body, mind you) playful.
And amidst all the fifties cutesy-ness, Marc has embedded some brilliant design technique. The cut of the pencil skirts is lovely; they are well-proportioned and give shape without stiffness. Which is interesting considering the fabric was stiffened on purpose to add body to the clothes. Thus they do not sculpt a woman’s body frame quite like old school Alaïa, but dramatically standaway. I love how it evokes the hourglass sensuality without being explicitly formfitting. Marc always reinterprets but never straight up mimics under the guise of paying homage.
I never really understood how a collection could be deemed “witty.” Fashion journalists and editors love to apply that to Miuccia’s designs, but I could never really see past the kitschy aspects of it. But now I totally see it in Marc’s collection. He reminds us of a great fashion period where structure had reigned and then transforms it into a playful rendition. One can easily fall into the caricature of it (especially since he embossed like everything with polka dots), but Marc manages to bring attention to the stereotypical social construct of femininity at that time without falling into farce. And for that, I tip my hat at you good sir.
MFD - Multiple Fashion Disorder 
Leave a comment