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This season he was all about lace, sometimes as-is or covered in silicone\u2014a blouse, a pencil skirt, a mini dress. Plus, a black suit and a fur jacket (sometimes over the former, at times flying solo with a pair of stilettos). It was striking and convincing. Aspirational, even, when placed against the backdrop of the shimmering Eiffel Tower at night. Vaccarello knows sexy, his Saint Laurent woman is the kind that lives and breathes it, and employs it to her advantage. There was an air of fetish emanating from this collection, a sense of danger. One can appreciate Vaccarello\u2019s focus at a time in fashion in which most designers put everything but the kitchen sink on the runway, simply to see what sticks. If only his silhouette wasn\u2019t so reliant on thinness on the runway, too.<\/p>\n
If Saint Laurent spoke to the decadent side of desire, of the way in which fashion, and the wealthy, close their gilded gates in times of communal distress. Then Chemena Kamali of Chlo\u00e9, who was once Vaccarello\u2019s deputy at Saint Laurent, was aiming for the opposite, looking for empathy and humanity, she said, by way of folklore. She made sheer dresses that weren\u2019t sexy or beguiling, but rather set forth a sense of warmth. It was Kamali\u2019s best-rounded outing since she joined, even if she stuck a bit too closely to a singular silhouette.<\/p>\n
\u201cThis sense of humanity, community spirit, and empathy feels essential right now,\u201d Kamali wrote in her collection notes. What she meant by right now, exactly, is not clear, but one feels encouraged to read between the lines.<\/p>\n<\/div>\n