When reviewing any fashion show or simply viewing it, the audience must take a number of factors into consideration, knowledge in this instance holds power of critique. Firstly, the audience must have knowledge of the creative director's past work and their vision for the brand. Secondly, to familiarise themselves with the brand itself. Anyone who knows of the Comme des Garçons label is aware of the brand's aesthetics - that it is a brand which deals with the unconventional and avant-garde aesthetics within fashion. And so, for anyone who has not come across the work of Rei Kawakubo, it may be a shock to learn that Comme des Garçons has developed a cult following over the years simply because of it's rejection of the aesthetics of mainstream fashion.
The way in which Comme des Garçons manifests itself each season is something truly exceptional. It is always unexpected and distinctly different from the hundreds of collections presented every year. The mood at the latest collection was extremely dark for the most part. Even the pink and white garments still did not promote any light or brightness, it was still very much dismal. In the last few seasons for Comme des Garçons the garments have felt extremely conservative in the way that the garments have created a trapping around the model. These garments impose themselves onto the audience, they scream and demand that the audience's concentration of attention on them and them only. This collection was strict and disciplined in the sense of it's aesthetics and it's interpretation.
Yet Kawakubo's offering this season felt like a re-interpretation of seasons past. Instead of creating something entirely new, it felt as though it was an adaptation of the Comme des Garçons past collections and a re-issuing of their collections in a way which would conform to our social system nowadays. Although this collection did feel much more cleaner and pragmatic than past collections. It is also interesting to note that Kawakubo's offerings never feel wrong or awkward to a fashion audience. It's simply accepted and taken as another initiative as challenging the limitations of fashion and it's relationship with art. It all but seem's as if Rei Kawakubo in this world, can do no wrong. Perhaps it is because of the violent distress that each collection portrays in comparison to the other designers at Paris Fashion Week that Comme des Garçons and it's namesake is so readily praised in it's entirety.
Images from style.com. View the full collection here.
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