Our Favorite Paris Fashion Week Moments So Far

0:05This is The Run Through. I'm Nicole Phelps. Today is the last day of our daily Paris Fashion Week coverage. And to close out the week, I'm here in the Paris Vogue offices with Vogue's fashion news director and run-through regular, my friend Mark Holgate, and Claire Thompson-Jeanville, head of editorial content at Vogue France. Welcome back, Mark. And Claire, we're very happy to have you here. Bonjour. Bonjour. We're going to do this in French, aren't we? Yes, let's do it in French. make real real fools of myself at least this is one of those really busy periods for us as editors we're coming off of new york london milan and now we are smack dab in the middle of paris fashion how are you both holding up well i did uh an abbreviated tour uh this season i did new york and now i'm in paris i got here yesterday so i sadly missed dior and sadly missed a liar and sadly missed Courage.

1:04But I did see some things, but yes, missed a few things. I'm sure you watched it all very closely online. I did. I looked at Vogue Runway. Thank you. I'm doing well. This is my home city. So I'm enjoying everyone being in town. Loved Tom Ford last night. Just feeling the good energy. The sun's out. The weather is incredible. It's spring here in Paris. All you New Yorkers, we're here to make you feel jealous about that. But we are going to backtrack to talk about Milan a little bit. It is a city that is used to fashion week disruptions. But there was nothing quite like Dolce & Gabbana's outdoor show.

1:46I heard you talking about Dolce & Gabbana earlier this week, Mark. And I think you quite liked the low-key vibe of the cargo pants and bedazzled jeans. Well, it's my uniform. no i mean i do like when you know a designer or designers in this case who are known for doing one thing kind of shake it up a bit and do something different and even staging that show you know taking it out of that theater taking it out into that street which any of us who've been to milan knows it's like a death trap because you've got those trams kind of trundling past at high speed and just the whole vibe i think of just kind of getting out of the space be it the real space or your own particular kind of headspace to me made it kind of fun to look at you know and uh claire why don't we talk about prada because that was something that was on your mind uh earlier where we were prepping for this yeah uh a real effort on mutual prada and raf simmons part to make awkward shapes make uh ugly clothes i like this idea of um what is feminine beauty You know, what is a perfection, female perfection?

2:57And also, yeah, I just love the hair. I just love the, it's always so intelligent and thought provoking, desirable. It's like, I always question, I'm like, could I wear that? Could I not? Would I wear that? But I just always feel - I can't picture you in a baggy house dress, I have to say. No, but I could definitely do the nothing hair. And, you know, maybe I could try one of those dresses. I don't know. With combat boots? Yeah, something like that. But yeah, no, it's just always thought provoking, isn't it? And so exciting. Yeah, smart. Smart to ask us to talk about femininity right now because, you know, it was right around the time of the Oscars.

3:40It was a few days before the Oscars. And that's a moment where we see, you know, women in their shining, perfected, airbrushed, filtered glory, right? And then for them to sort of poke holes in this idea and say, actually, you don't have to wear a corset. You don't have to wear a bra. in. Well, yeah, I mean, it's, I mean, we're so used to seeing that kind of idea of shell act perfection, you know, sprayed and tanned and glossed and jeweled and everything. And this set of Oscars, it felt, well, this Oscar season, it felt even kind of more extreme in a way. It almost felt like an AI version of it to some degree, right?

4:15You just, it was kind of staggering. And, you know, you can read into that what you like, but I mean, I love Prada for that reason too, for all the reasons that Claire said. I mean, I think just that sense of, it felt very mutual, you know the kind of idea of going back to the tropes of the 50s and 60s i always love that kind of the the you know the ladylike pump you know the the kind of amazing coats and tailoring that she and now she and raf always do season after season that that kind of incredible manipulation of the fur around the shoulders the fake fur around the shoulders um yeah and the awkwardness of it i you know i i'm always there for a celebration of awkwardness um it speaks to me so i i thought it was very just again because i wasn't there but even just you know it's furiously scrolling through it on the app on our app to to as it as you know almost the minute the show was finished just so i could see because it does feel as a kind of urgency i think around what she and raf are doing at prada you know it kind of feels like it's there's a kind of interesting commentary on our times.

5:22One thing that I find interesting in fashion is how cyclical it is. And once again, at 91, it's Mr. Armani's moment. At least it is for me. I thought he had a really beautiful, beautiful show. And I love the setup. We were on these sort of banquettes, the same as he had put into place in the New York show he did last fall. And And so a sense of relaxation, it's the end of the season. And he sort of reminded us why he has been, you know, the maestro for four decades. I mean, just to be able to have those surprises of, you know, seeing him, you know, think about that very kind of beautiful, soft, coppery, gilded kind of color palette.

6:11But the reimagining season after season of the Armani suit, which I understand, Nicole, you and your colleague from Vaig-Romway, Tiziana Cardini, are thinking of buying and sharing. Time-sharing, I think. Time-sharing was a phrase, yes. But I loved it. And I loved the idea that he's always someone who's had a flat shoe and had a certain sense of a kind of quite grounded, despite the kind of glamour and sophistication of the clothes. But it's interesting also, I think, just that idea, you're looking at someone who really knows how to make clothes. And, you know, he's a little like a liar in that sense.

6:48You know, there's a constancy to the work. And sometimes, you know, you look at it through fresh eyes and sometimes you're maybe more familiar with what he's doing. But it felt kind of renewed to me in some way. yeah I agree I love it I feel like Milan it was a really good season for Milan like there were so many you know it was sort of like this higher female energy and just like so many things that or silhouettes that were sort of empowering for women and I do think that Armani you know he you know he's someone who who loves women and you can feel that obviously but um sometimes maybe we forget he's been around for so long that we forget that he's so good at dressing as and i love it when there's a show like that it's like okay voila we're just gonna you know just remind everybody let me show you how it's done voila exactly in the color palettes and um yeah there's a lot of pieces that um that stood out for me so that was a great for me that was a highlight definitely that show yeah i would love to have seen that marnie go from armani to marnie i have to say that was one show that I would love to have seen.

7:56Yes, on the subject of color palettes, Francesco Risseau really had some of the most sensational colors of the season at Marnie. This acid yellow and sort of a salmon-y pink and a really bright, vivid turquoise. And, you know, sometimes putting them all together in these sort of clingy satin dresses, a little bit 1930s-ish maybe in sensibility. and so artistic. And some of these pieces were hand-painted by Francesco himself and two artist friends of his. And it was a real celebration of creativity in an industry. I think Sarah Mower put it really incredibly, a desertification of creativity in high luxury, something like that.

8:48There's a, you know, there is a sense sometimes that fashion starts to look the same wherever you go, but definitely not at his Marnie. Well, I like that Francesco also really allies emotion to creativity because to me the two are so closely linked. And when you think about that tour he did where he was showing in Japan and he was showing in New York and Brooklyn under the Brooklyn Bridge, which is an incredible show, Back to Milan. I think he showed in Paris one season as well. And you just feel that he's someone who kind of wears his heart and his creativity on his sleeve and his hemline and his trousers and his tailor it just it's always evident it's always there and i like that it's kind of naked in a way i think you know there's nothing you know we talk about the kind of control and the i mean the the designers always trying to present such a kind of perfect image of themselves and such a perfect representation and with him it's a little bit and i mean this in a good way messy and i kind of like that Okay, we're going to take a quick break.

9:52Our thoughts on London and Paris when we are back.

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10:47All right, we're back and we're going to check in quickly about London. Were there any highlights for either of you from London? I think we were all watching remotely. We were watching remotely. We were from different parts of the world. Yeah, I mean, I think we were all sort of anticipating Burberry somehow as well. Well, it's the last show of the week, right? It's the last show of the week. yeah I love a great boot I'm a boot girl I love boots love coats I love a fierce country sort of silhouette layering I was into it I was really into it actually I have to say I thought you did a good job yeah I thought it looked really great I loved the casting I thought that was kind of amazing the he in question being Daniel Lee that's yes sorry yes sorry Daniel I also enjoyed Erdem's show.

11:41I mean, I thought it felt very personal and emotional. You know, he used images by the painter C. Donnhy, which I thought was, you know, something that felt kind of very special and unique. I liked all the kind of those kind of quite exaggerated volumes. And I was kind of interested to see Dallara Findaclu and that mix again of kind of emotion-fuelled creativity, a kind of certain anger and a certain, you know, you know, challenging of the world I thought was really fantastic. And all those kind of slightly medieval meets a pair of battered converse kind of looks with the, you know, the kind of all the work that went into them, the leather and the sense of wear and tear and, but also kind of incredible construction.

12:28And she's someone who, you know, I know she's been around for a while, but somehow that happens too. someone just seems to capture the moment, right? And then you're like, oh, that feels really reflective of our times. And you really see their work and their creativity. Yeah, I thought that show was mega. I feel those sexy pieces, the celebrities, especially the rock musicians, just going to be lining up to wear those pieces. And Lara Stone back in the runway. Yes. Yeah. We love a Lara Stone sighting. uh so we have segued very naturally into paris and so now let's talk about yesterday because uh there was not one but two major debuts first it was julian klausner's turn at dries van noten and later in the day we saw heider ackerman's tom ford so let's talk about julian first well i was really, I have to say, I sat there and was sitting kind of opposite Dries Van Noten.

13:30Who's in the front row watching. Who's in the front row. I mean, bad enough that someone has to make their debut. But to make their debut with the designer whose house the name bears sitting front row, and also someone that's your former boss, I can't even begin to imagine the pressure on Julian. But I thought he did a terrific job i thought it was a really good start i mean it's you know i thought that he caught the kind of idea of you know i'm sorry to sound cliched uh but you know idea of a kind of an eclectic wardrobe put together in a kind of very personal way beautiful kind of textiles uh you know the idea of the embellishment and the handwork the slightly awkward 40s 50s shoe clearly awkward is my favorite you know thing about any aspect of fashion um so i thought he did a good job and i think he was right to keep it small and intimate you know this idea of just showing in a kind of beautiful gilded corridor at the opera garnier or palais garnier sorry i think it's actually called um so i thought good for him it's a good start yeah i thought that he had the hardest job of the three big debuts this season because uh as opposed to heider ackerman who is following you you know, a sort of short interim designer.

14:49And as opposed to Sarah Burton at Givenchy, who is going back to the beginning and looking at Hubert de Givenchy's very first collection from 70-some years ago. Julian, as you say, is following a beloved designer, somebody who, I mean, all of our friends in the industry wear it, our fellow editors, you know, at Vogue. And so it's a hard job to take over because the people who are looking, I think, have personal investment in it. And I, too, thought that he totally understands Dries Van Noten's codes. And at the same time, he was pretty courageous, I think, to step away from them. You know, the draping didn't really feel signature drees to me, but I like the fact that he was confident enough to try it.

15:46And, you know, I went to see him the day before the show at the showroom where he was doing fittings with models. And he was cool as a cucumber. He is, you know, great. You know, he just is very well-spoken and he had a lot to say about his collection, which I think is, you know, will help him as he continues there. Well, I think it's interesting about both those debuts is how do you take, you know, the signatures of designers, you know, which are so intimate and personal to them and bring enough of yourself, but without throwing up the baby with the bathwater where, you know, it looks unrecognizable.

16:22And it's a hard thing to do, and it's a kind of tricky balancing act. But I think both Hader Ackerman at Tom Ford and Julian Klausner at Dries Van Norton yesterday did. Both of them did a very good job. Claire, you love Tom Ford. You love Sider's Tom Ford. Yeah, I really did. Tell me why. It's just, I mean, you keep going on about wearability, so it's very basic. But it's true. I just identified with that silhouette, very evocative of some, you know, Tom Ford's sort of legacy. But at the same time, just I love these strong women. I love these very like flattering silhouettes, like quite bold. I love the hair.

17:05I spent like a good few minutes trying to figure out who actually had the shaved at the back and whose was like tucked under. But no, I love the leather. I just, I want Haider to win you know, I'm just in this phase and I was going to say that about Julien as well I'm sort of in this phase now where there's been so many musical chairs and now I think that there's this kind of we want people to win and we want them to do well and let's be like supportive and like when it's a good collection or you know, it's hard to step into those shoes you know, when we are like human beings but we are but you know, they have enough experience within the industry to understand like the memo.

17:49And I feel like, you know, those are big shoes that he's stepping into and especially the context of, you know, just previously. I think he was really chic and cool and gave us what we wanted with some surprises. I was, yeah, I was really into it. I would so agree with that. I mean, I think that he, I love the way that Haydn nodded to the kind of so many aspects of Tom's work at Gucci, at Saint Laurent, obviously at his own label there was things i remember seeing from previous collections at various houses that tom has uh spearheaded but it never felt like it was a greatest hits you know it felt like it being kind of imagined and re-envisioned by by heider akerman and i just thought the tailoring i mean i think that's the other thing as well to go back to armani and to to talk about azedina light like to to see things beautifully made beautifully rendered and you know They were all, I think, kind of questioning the kind of disposability of all fashion now.

18:48It doesn't matter where it comes from. So to see something that actually looked like it would stick around and last, all the beautiful leather that you were talking about, Clara, I thought was fantastic too. So I thought Hayter, again, had a tough job. You know, Tom sitting in that front row and he came out and bounded down the runway and gave him a hug. And it was, I think, a really, again, kind of very emotional moment. Well, on the subject of quality, we should talk about Sarah Burton, who is debuting tomorrow as Givenchy. We all know Sarah very well from her McQueen days, and I at least loved her McQueen.

19:22So are you excited for Givenchy? What are you expecting from Sarah? what are we expecting well first of all lovely that a woman is the creative director of a maison you know firstly and i am excited i'm sure it's going to be effortlessly elegant you know tailoring craftsmanship but you know she's following obviously a completely different vision which i always like as well so it's kind of a bit of a reset um i think it's an exciting time i just I love Givenchy's the brand anyway. I was always sort of connected somehow with each designer and found something I liked about it. So I'm really excited for her.

20:05What are you excited about? Oh, I'm excited too. I've always been crazy for her tailoring at McQueen. So I think it's great. She's back on the scene. I'm confident she'll show beautiful tailoring here. And, you know, she'll make all of the women she's dressed, like Cate Blanchett and Rooney Mara, very happy with those, I bet. Yeah, it was interesting. I did a piece on her for March issue. And I know you just interviewed her more recently, Nicole. And I love the kind of sense of confidence and humbleness. And I think she really has that in equal measure. And to me, that's such a great thing, because she's come in, and she's looked at this house, and she's gone right back to the very beginning.

20:51She went back to the very first collection, which I think was maybe 1952, I think and when she was showing me the look book from that very first collection I mean it was amazing how modern a lot of it looked and I don't know like again it's just that thing I don't want to keep sound like a boring stuck record who keeps repeating himself but it's someone who really knows how to make clothes it's not just about image or branding or causing some kind of front row for some I mean I'm sure she'll have all of those things too and you know as she stays at the house, but just someone who can really make clothes.

21:25And yes, Claire, absolutely. How great to have a woman leading a house. It's super important.

21:35We're going to take one more quick break. Back in a minute.

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22:18So we are about halfway through Paris with five more big days to come. But the first few days, I'm going to mention something that stood out for me yesterday, which was Nicolas Di Felice's Correza with the spectacular reverse anti-gravity confetti party and his really great clothes, which were sort of similarly constructed from these ribbons of fabric that he twisted and turned around the body in sort of minimal and very cool and young ways. I think he's a big talent. But what about you two? Is there anything that you liked? I was euphoric. I feel like I would do a day rave. It was such a cool idea.

23:07The music and this ticker-tick, I don't know how to describe it, confetti. But he is someone who really knows how to conjure up an energy, it's almost chemical. you know um and what i what i love as well is like when the girls you know that the girls feel cool and the girls feel good and what they're wearing and that really like transmits i have to say that i like that there were more clothes this time because it's not easy just to wear like a tiny bondo and i want to wear those clothes but or even for styling you know so it's nice that there's a few more pieces um so yeah that was that was a high i really enjoyed that i have to say what else have you liked this week well i wanted to talk about the row i was sitting i was sitting briefly on the floor which i wasn't unhappy about but i quickly was told that i should sit on the sofa um but no that was interesting the format was interesting but i loved it i mean i keep going on about a hair this season but the hair was cool and i lost i spoke to someone i don't know where her name is from the financial times yesterday who sort of shuffled up to me outside Tom Ford and asked me about the row and I realised that I love a matching thick woolly tights with a coat it must like hark back to me in my boarding school days my Scottishness love a matching tight tights and coat situation and the fact that there were no shoes yeah it was really that was quite an interesting show what did you think well I had the same impulse I mean, it's one of those things as well where, you know, you set a show from Mary-Kate and Ashley Olsen and, you know, people are looking at it both from a kind of, you know, professional capacity and also really looking at it through the lens of, oh my God, I would love to have that.

25:00Oh my God, I would love to own that. And, yeah, I was a little perplexed by the no shoes. I just kept thinking, did they not turn up? Did they not like them? Did they decide they just wanted to? and I kept just thinking maybe they're just trying to emphasize some idea of you know like that idea that you kick your shoes off after your day's done though I guess maybe at that point you would also put the handbag down if they hadn't done but for me the things I loved well first of all my favorite celebrity sighting of the week was the combination of Jeff Koons and Brigitte Macron Estella McCartney, which was kind of amazing to see.

25:42And I also love this young Belgian designer, Julie Kegels, who has done her third collection. She showed in a tiny theater in the 17th. She's not on the official calendar. And I like the wit and the humor of her clothes and the slightly kind of sly subversiveness of them. She also played into this whole idea, a bit like Stella, whose show was on the same day, and this idea of corporate wear and office wear, I guess, you know, we're all thinking about the back to the office mandate and going back in. But she allied it with this book that she'd found in a flea market in LA, which was all about how you can kind of decorate for success from 1980.

26:22So there's a lot of references to kind of furniture and to kind of, you know, kind of idea of kind of corporate wear and branding, but done in such a kind of fun way. I thought the show was great. We were all at Chloe this morning. It was Chimina Kamali's third big Chloe show. What is your reaction to that show? Yay. Yay. No, it was cool. I'm just really happy about the season. I can't explain it to you. It's like, you know, when there's seasons like that, you're like, yes, like good energy. Good clothes. wow great clothes i love the whole like y2k bag position within the crook of the arm and they sort of like i love this kind of um i re-editions you know there seems to be a lot of like re-editions of bags and somehow it's like a play on vintage a play on the brand identity as well um but also giving us what we want you know the hits um i like very much this um you know uh boho uh i was looking at the girls the chloe girls in the front row and i don't know it just was really felt like a breath of fresh air and it felt like you know there's some nice surprises and um all the charms and fake fur i was i was honestly i was i was into it i left like with plenty of ideas it put you in a good mood i have to say i was watching it i thought feels like shemina's having fun doing this she's enjoying it she's loving it um i thought there some really terrific clothes in there.

27:50I liked all the kind of lace evening at the end. I loved the jackets. I loved those lanky kind of stovepipe pants, which made me think of late 90s Chloe. I thought it was really good. And also all those beautiful kind of sheer bias cut skirts with a little jacket and the flat shoes. The casting was great. It was good. I think she did a really great job. Iniko was back. What are you excited to see? As I said, we have five days more. What What are the shows you're looking forward to? I'll give you one. I am very curious to see Valentino. It'll be Alessandra Michele's second ready-to-wear collection.

28:30And the first one was so evocative with that set, the cracked mirror floor and the furniture draped in the dust covers. And I wonder where his imagination will take us next. Were you at the couture? No, that was the ready-to-wear. But there was a couture show since then. Yes, there was a couture show since then. Just in terms of the spectacle. The monumentalness of that show. Yeah, so I'm kind of like, wow, where is this going to go? Yeah. I agree with you. I'm excited for that as well. Yeah, I mean, it always feels emotional and experiential with him. So, yeah, I'm kind of interested to see what he does too.

29:07I haven't been to a Balenciaga show or a Louis Vuitton show in ages. and the way that my Paris schedules work, I often leave before I see those shows. So I'm excited to see both of those. What about you, Claire? Yeah, Balenciaga, definitely. Saint Laurent. Yeah, Saint Laurent. Just love Saint Laurent. I'm not going to lie. You know, the glamour. It's always so impeccable, isn't it? It's always so like, I just love that silhouette. They're very good at casting. I don't know, I'm excited and surprised every time. What else? Vuitton? Vuitton have changed location, but I can't figure out. It's a mystery.

29:45I don't think any. Yeah, I think they're keeping it secret from us. And I wish to get the bus, apparently, which I'm not happy about. Say what? We're all meeting outside the cafe and getting the bus. I'm fine to take the bus. I just want to know, is there a bus back? Are we hitchhiking back? How far is it? I think about that when you used to do the shows out at the Louis Vuitton Foundation. And I was like, I'd hate to get stranded here. The traffic has been extraordinary. Claire, how do you deal with Paris traffic on a day-to-day basis? She's going into a zen mode. I namaste my way through life.

30:24No, I have got it down to a fine art now. I take my bike. I hear a lot of people are riding bikes around town. I take my bike and then with the kids, I take them to school in Metro. I leave my bike here. I did a lot. I very, very rarely drive myself. And, you know, Uber and taxis here, you know, if you know Paris, you know, it's just like a sort of not a human, particularly pleasant experience. Everyone's stressed and transferring their energy. So I like to keep my own environment and get on my bike. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. Yeah. So to conclude, what would you say are some of the themes and ideas that are percolating up this season?

31:08I mean, we've talked a lot about, or I don't know if we have, I've been talking elsewhere about fur and fake fur and shirling and how much of that there is. And it's a real phenomenon. It's a very, you know, sort of a 180 from the anti-fur stance we had, you know, five years ago or so but uh other than that what what are some themes that are coming up for you i was looking at milan even and i'm just like i'm really into this woman who's dressed up and she's confident and it's like like a bigger silhouette a flattering silhouette it feels like more real life but sort of um i keep saying this higher female energy but i really do feel that you know it's like the long slinky dresses and the big coat cinched in and and shoulders and fake fur and like long legs and big into bare leg and a little fake fur coat just feels like sexy cool for me the energy is really on point yeah it's it's been interesting it's it's just to see kind of all these tropes of kind of quote-unquote glamour you know it's of you know saying they're called fake fur and sheiling maybe perhaps seen as less glamorous but that's been used in very glamorous ways this season quote-unquote glamorous ways also all of the kind of the sparkle and the shine um for example that we just saw at uh Rabanne with Julian de Senna which I thought was a really terrific collection and to go to your point there about Saint Laurent it also feels that that is something that Anthony Vaccarella has also been exploring for some time this idea of things just like more effort into the into the clothes more effort um into kind of making just things feel kind of really kind of special and i think also just trying to make more of a case for some kind of emotional connection to fashion when you know i think we're all we can all be a little bit just exhausted from from everything that's going on right so it's it's great you know to hear you just being so excited about it claire because that it's it's we want to be excited right we want to be kind of engaged and energized and inspired because i think that you know we sometimes we forget that the reality of things you know so if you look at the kind of a climate of fashion and selling and you know matches or even you know in store and sales because we're all bombarded with figures and dismal predictions and things like that it's always to me promising when you connect with something that is not a million miles away with the silhouette that you want to wear and I think ultimately you know times change and there are different phases of life there's phases of you know creatively where you want to sort of project and be weird and abstract and I think that we're all in a more you know people are looking at how much they're spending or not but it's much more about um yeah like investment pieces or digging out what silhouettes you already have, what coat you already have, and how you can wear and interpret, you know, the looks on the runway.