Paris Fashion Week: Balenciaga Spring 2011

Some designers prefer the models to blend into the collection as human extensions of the clothes, using sensational hair and makeup to mask the models and project the designer’s particular vision.

Not so at the Balenciaga Spring/Summer 2011 show in Paris, where designer Nicolas Ghesquiere found inspiration in singularity. So, in an effort to get away from what he calls the “clone-model thing,” Ghesquiere and his team took to the streets, literally. Balenciaga held street castings in cities around the world – from Amsterdam to Australia – and plucked three unknown girls to walk the runway alongside the likes of Gisele Bundchen, Miranda Kerr, Amber Valletta, and Stella Tennant.

The collection itself experimented with masculinity; as Ghesquiere notes, “The boyish side of a woman can be very attractive.”  The result was a punk-infused, slightly androgynous presentation that incorporated the past while looking towards the future. If that sounds confusing, take the opening pieces as an example: the houndstooth pattern was inspired by a 1965 Cristobal Balenciaga silk dress, but reinterpreted as glossy faux leather coats in contrasting reds, blues, and blacks. Likewise, the tuxedo inspired suit separates were masculine in style but cut for a woman’s body; paired with combat boots, the look cannot be confined to one sex or era.

The collection explored yet another dichotomy between the complex and the spare-- and Balenciaga excelled in both, with intricately sequined dresses and boldly patterned, spliced button down shirts alongside the finale pieces of incredibly well-constructed but stark dresses.

In all, Ghesquiere presents us with as much of an intellectual puzzle as a Spring 2011 collection. The contrasts of masculine and feminine, simple and elaborate, past and future are subtly sewn into Balenciaga’s latest collection. The particularly brilliant element of Ghesquiere’s vision lays in its appreciation of the wearer herself; the ensembles are designed to be deconstructed and reinterpreted rather than passively adopted.

Photo source: Style.com