Irenebrination: Notes on Architecture, Art, Fashion, Fashion Law & Technology

The Landmark NFT Lawsuit That Will Redefine the Application of Trademark Law: Hermès International et al. v. Mason Rothschild

Last month a trademark drama revolving around stripes took place in a New York court. A few weeks have passed since that case closed, but now there is a new trial to keep an eye on. This time it is all about handbags - real ones and "non-fungible token" bags - as the Hermès Vs Mason Rothschild's MetaBirkins trial kicked off at the beginning of the week in the Southern District Court of New York. The jury trial is being overseen by U.S. District Judge Jed S. Rakoff.

As you may remember from a previous post, in May 2021 American artist Mason Rothschild (real name Sonny Estival) launched his "Baby Birkin" NFT in collaboration with Eric Ramirez. The NFT consisted in the animation of a 40-week-old fetus growing inside a transparent Hermès' Birkin bag. It was launched on the curated social and shopping platform Basic.Space and sold for about $47,000, but, in that case, the French luxury house didn't contact the authors to complain about the NFT as that was just a one-off.

In November 2021, Rothschild launched 100 "MetaBirkin" NFTs and an Instagram account linked to the project. The artist's MetaBirkins were essentially Hermès' Birkin bags reinvented in bright coloured fuzzy faux fur. Some of them were also inspired by artworks by Van Gogh, Goya, Dali, Leonardo da Vinci, Michelangelo, Hokusai, Twombly, Rothko and Maurizio Cattelan (surprisingly, Rothschild wasn't sued also by the artists he took inspiration from for his bags or by the museums where the artworks he borrowed for the MetaBirkins are preserved). The NFTs were launched and sold on the OpenSea platform. 

At the beginning, Rothschild conceived them as a "tribute" to Hermès' famous design, but then he highlighted they were a commentary on fashion's history of animal cruelty and on Hermès' ultra-expensive leather handbags.

The situation soon changed and Rothschild received a cease and desist letter from Hermès. On his Instagram page the artist appealed to the First Amendment, even though OpenSea removed the MetaBirkins from its platform and Rothschild started selling them on Rarible, another NFT platform.

The saga continued with a trademark lawsuit (Hermès International et al. v. Mason Rothschild), filed by the French luxury company in January 2022. The company stated that Rothschild was refusing "to stop selling the METABIRKINS NFTs," which allegedly caused consumer confusion. Rothschild was accused of trademark infringement, false designation of origin, trademark dilution, cybersquatting, and injury to business reputation and dilution under New York General Business Law.

Rothschild took again to Instagram to explain that his lawyers at Lex Lumina PLLC highlighted that the First Amendment in the US Constitution gave him the right to make and sell art depicting Birkin bags, "just as it gave Andy Warhol the right to make and sell art depicting Campbell's soup cans."

But, as stated in a previous post, this case may not be the proper one: yes, Warhol did not seek permission to use the cans from the soup company, but Campbell's Soup artworks were seen as non-infringing because it was clear to the public that it would have been unlikely for the company to sponsor paintings. The use of the cans remained in the artistic realm and Warhol didn't do commercial products such as T-shirts (but sold his artworks featuring the soup cans) and Campbell didn't complain; the company was instead happy to see their product on the walls of museums and in collectors' homes.

A bitter legal battle followed, instead, between Hermès and Rothschild throughout 2022: in March last year the artist answered with his own filing, insisting his art was protected by First Amendment rights and selling it did not diminish those rights. That appeal was later dismissed, while Hermès filed an Amended Complaint, highlighting alleged consumer confusion.

Between March and April 2022, Rothschild filed a Motion to Dismiss Hermès' amended complaint, invoking the precedent set by the "Rogers Vs Grimaldi" copyright case (1989; also used in the Nike / Lil Nas X / MSCHF litigation, as you may remember), but Hermès filed an Opposition to the Motion. In May 2022 Judge Jed Rakoff of the U.S. District Court for the Southern District of New York stated that "The Rogers Test" was appropriate in part, but denied Rothschild's Motion to Dismiss. Several appeals and Notices of Motion for Summary Judgment and Memos in Opposition of the Motions for Summary followed and, eventually, in November a trial date was announced for 2023.

The jury trial started on Monday, 30th January: Hermés is represented by law firm BakerHostetler and their attorney Oren Warshavsky focused during Monday's session on trademark infringement, presenting to the jury a Birkin bag and explaining how it usually takes an artisan 18 to 24 hours to make one. Jurors were then showed Rothschild's social media posts about the MetaBirkins, including one that read, "Not your mother's Birkin".

Attorney Rhett O. Millsaps II, from the legal firm defending Rothschild, Lex Lumina, highlighted again that his art and artistic expression are protected by the First Amendment, reminding the jury the artist sold his NFTs for $450 each, but their values increased (and, according to him Rothschild only got "a small percentage" of those sales) via the resale market. Rothschild's attorney again compared the artist's modus operandi to Andy Warhol's.

Yet Judge Rakoff did not allow Dr. Blake Gopnik, author of a biography of Andy Warhol, to testify at the trial and make comparison between the MetaBirkins and Warhol's art. According to Judge Rakoff, Gopnik (who supports the thesis that MetaBirkins can be filed under the "Business Art" practice) would be the only person who could draw parallels between Warhol's and Rothschild's art.

Rothschild's legal team also mentioned the fact that the idea to cover bags in fur was a satirical commentary and that Hermés was trying to punish the artist being afraid of what his art may say about luxury culture (yet it should be noted that, when the artist first launched his project, there was no mention of it being a bitter commentary of the fashion/luxury industry).

Rothschild's team also explained that the artist reached out to some reporters who had mistakenly linked Hermés to the MetaBirkins to clarify it wasn't an official collaboration.Robert Chavez, president and chief executive officer of Hermés Americas, appeared in a pre-recorded testimony at Monday's trial and provided information about the Birkin bag and its history. Then, to highlight that the project had generated confusion among consumers, he noted that, while guest lecturing in 2021 at Columbia University and Harvard Business School, students had asked if the company was involved with the MetaBirkins.

He went on to explain that Hermés had previously been developing its own plans to venture into the metaverse and NFTs for a few years. It should be highlighted that Hermès and other fashion companies are registered in specific fields that allow them to sell perfumes, accessories, garments and, in some cases, home décor items. But most of them aren't registered to sell digital products in the metaverse. Birkin is a name registered indeed in connection with leather goods, and not in connection with virtual products.

Nicolas Martin, group general counsel for Hermès, who was heard on Tuesday, also stated that the company was working on a "miniverse": even though he wasn't aware of the specific plans regarding it, he explained that one possibility was that of using digital twins for authentication aims and NFTs as virtual benefits attached to physical products that may give consumers access to exclusive events (a common practice nowadays to engage consumers).

Hermés has sold more than $1 billion worth of Birkins (each bag generally retails from $12,000 to $200,000) in the past decade in the U.S. alone and one interesting point that came from Chavez's testimony was the fact that he was not aware of any lost revenue due to the MetaBirkins, so the company wasn't damaged by the project. Rothschild's legal team also emloyed Hermés International financial analysis to show how its ready-to-wear and accessories category had grown at two times the rate of its leather goods and saddlery (Birkins are under this category) in the first half of 2022 versus the first half of 2021.

One confusing moment came courtesy of Hermès' expert witness, Nichols College's professor of data science Kevin Mentzer: he claimed that NFTs are not digital art and that they are collectibles, but his explanation of what NFTs are and how they work was deemed by Judge Rakoff as "far more confusing than helpful" for the jury.

The case continues and, while it is rather complicated, it is legally intriguing and important as it will help defining how to apply trademark law to NFTs and the virtual world (do trademarks IRL apply indeed to the virtual world? Do such rights automatically extend to the digital space and the metaverse, or should companies like Hermès be registered also as producing digital products to be able to sue somebody?) and how First Amendment rights apply to the metaverse.

Besides, there is another conundrum here, as highlighted in a previous post about the case: Hermès is seeking monetary damages, including Rothschild's profits (according to OpenSea that amounts to over 200 Ethereum, around $900,000) and wants Rothschild to transfer the MetaBirkins.com domain to it and to "deliver up for destruction to Hermès all unauthorized products and advertisements in his possession or under his control bearing any of Hermès' Federally Registered Trademarks or any simulation, reproduction, counterfeit, copy or colorable imitation." But NFTs are stored on the blockchain where records cannot be altered once they are entered; and if an NFT of a Birkin that was sold became inaccessible, the individual owners of the allegedly infringing NFTs would be damaged (and will Hermès also end up going after them? and is it actually legal to go after the people who bought a MetaBirkin NFT, if the non-fungible token in question is not actually a picture of a bag infringing someone's copyright, but a smart contract and lines of code on the blockchain?) Sounds like the jury will have a lot to ponder and debate about in the next few days.

Flexible Floating Futures: Urban Rigger by Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG)

Yesterday's post closed with a location that will be featured at the Open House Copenhagen architectural event (25th - 26th March 2023). So, let's explore today another landmark that it will be possible to visit during this event that, developed in collaboration with the Danish Architecture Center, celebrates Copenhagen's official designation as World Capital of Architecture for 2023 - the Urban Rigger project (but you can also opt for a virtual tour of the structure). 

Founded in 2013 and designed in March 2015 by Bjarke Ingels Group (BIG) with Bjarke Ingels, Jakob Sand, Jakob Lange and Finn Nørkjær as partners in charge, Urban Rigger was launched to respond to the shortage of affordable student housing in Copenhagen.

Rather than opting for traditional buildings on land, the project focused on developing accommodation on unutilized waterfronts, turning undeveloped areas into vibrant communities. The project also explores the mental, physical, social and sustainable benefits that may come from a lifestyle on water, proving that living by the water shouldn't necessarily be a luxury for the very few.

Houses can indeed become more accessible by changing the materials they are built with. In this case, BIG upcycled 9 containers units for each rigger, taking them from the excess stock of the declining shipping industry in Western Europe.

Each rigger has three floors: the irregular hexagonal floating pontoon base; three containers forming a screened courtyard and featuring one apartment in each, and another floor with 6 containers and nine apartments. As a whole, each rigger includes twelve 23-30 sqm studios each with a kitchen and bathroom.

The central courtyard features bicycle racks, a kayak dock, a bathing platform and a barbecue area. Staircases connect the containers to the lower floor below sea level. This section includes a technical room, individual storage spaces and communal facilities such as a kitchen, lounge area and laundromat; some riggers even have fitness facilities.

Another staircase leads to the rooftop terraces overlooking the Copenhagen canals as well: two of them are covered with sedum plants that also insulate the containers, while another rooftop holds a photovoltaic system. It is indeed the sun that delivers all the hot water needed by the residents and powers the low-energy pumps that provide heat.

This is not the only sustainable feature in this project: seawater serves as a natural source for heat with the help of low energy pumps; the watertight concrete hull requires no maintenance for the next 100 years, and microbes, mussels, barnacles, crabs, algae, can grow straight on the surfaces of the concrete foundation. Besides, the units are equipped with energy-saving LED lighting and the apartments are equipped with hydronic floor heating drawn from the seawater surrounding the concrete hull and circulated, as stated above, by low energy pumps.

The project also tackles the rising of global sea levels: in 2050, 90% of the world's cities will have to deal with the rising sea levels to protect the people living near riversides and coasts; building on water will allow in these cases to regain space.

The system, as you may guess, is extremely flexible: once built, the structure can be easily moved on the water, as if it were a boat, and replicated as well in other harbour cities that have limited spaces (would this work in places such as Venice where there is a shortage of student accommodation?). The structures are also built with the necessary features to allow expansion.

The project is designed to foster conscious living and it looks like it is working: residents on average have 34% lower energy consumption compared to their neighbours on land. Besides, the riggers encourage connections and a sense of community, allowing the residents to live a dynamic lifestyle (imagine opening your window and being able to jump straight into the water for a refreshing swim).

The first students moved into the units placed by the waterfront of Copenhagen's Refshaleøen (just a few kilometers from BIG's ski-slope incinerator) in 2016. The island had been deserted for over 30 years after formerly serving as a shipyard. New Urban Riggers were added as the years passed, turning the project into the coolest student accommodation in the world.

There have been several projects employing shipping containers in the last few years, including Stadium 974 recently built for the Fifa World Cup 2022 in Qatar (its name refers to Qatar's international dialling code, as well as the number of shipping containers used to build its staircases, kiosks, bathrooms and parts of its exterior).

Yet BIG's Urban Rigger has a playful aspect missing from many others: the carbon neutral shipping containers prove indeed that it is possible to create innovative architectural and functional projects that cater to modern needs and combine sustainability and flexibility with a fun twist.

Optimistic and Soothing Pastel Palettes: From Couture and Food Utopias to a Columbarium

Soothing pastels - pale yellow, sugar pink, baby blue, sorbet orange and soft mint - are an obvious choice for grand Haute Couture creations, think classical gowns and voluminous opera coats of the kind we usually see at red carpet events, such as those in Giambattista Valli's S/S 23 collection.

Characterised by colours borrowed from sunny happy days at the Beverly Hills Hotel on Sunset Boulevard, these gowns with trains and poufs, bows and swishing swirls of fabrics are designed to cater a ultra-wealthy clientele.

Elegant, but not desperately innovative, they ooze optimism and point at happy times, lavish parties, award ceremonies and gala nights, things that most of us, mere mortals, will never partake in. 

But you don't need to go bankrupt to enjoy escapist pastel shades, there are indeed exhibitions featuring artworks that can reward us with some (literal) eye candy.

An example is "When Flowers Dream" by internationally-renowned Australian artist Tanya Schultz (AKA Pip & Pop), currently on at the Shirley Sherwood Gallery of Botanical Art, Kew Gardens, London (open until 5th March 2023). Schultz is better known for her immersive colour saturated artworks employing sugar, candy, sweets, crystals and assorted playful craft materials such as modelling clay.

"When Flowers Dream" features imagined worlds that promise us a happy and endless food-utopia, a rich horn of plenty of sugary confections and a mythical landscape inspired by fairy tales featuring magical places of abundance such as the land of Cockaigne, a place with streets paved with pastries, houses built from cakes and mountains made of pudding.

A bespoke highly detailed installation developed in collaboration with Kew scientists explores the idea of a food utopia for the future: there are more than 7,000 known species of edible plants which we could be eating, and crop diversity is key to feeding the world's growing population.

New products - plant-based foods of the future including underutilised species such as Pandanus, Akkoub, Ensete, Baobab, Passiflora, Carissa macrocarpa, Dovyalis caffra, Dioscorea villosa and Morama bean - may save us from food scarcity as climate change impacts our environment. 

Schultz sourced some of the actual fruits and seeds from various gardens around Australia and created moulds of them. She then cast them in different materials such as sugar, resin, silicone and plaster, and painted them in colours that gave them the appearance of being really edible.

Joyfully excessive, this confectionery indulgence and food fantasy about consumption and abundance is a visual feast of colour and sweetness, enticing, appealing and eliciting a sense of optimism with its eye-popping candy colours and sugary pastels.

But pastels can also be used for architectural projects linked with death: Bispebjerg Kirkegård (Bispebjerg Cemetery) in Copenhagen, built in 1903, features Instagrammable cherry trees that blossom in Spring at its entrance. But this pink show is not the only pastel tone you will spot in the graveyard. The cemetery features indeed a rather sui generis columbarium with finely shaped urns on display in chambers characterized by varying depths.

Designed by architect Holger Jacobsen and opened in 1920, the columbarium was very popular in the 1920s, as nearly 40 percent of those who were cremated in Copenhagen chose to have their ashes displayed in urns (popularity declined as the years passed and the two oldest columbaria were eventually closed).

The colorful rotunda remains the most popular urn chamber in the columbarium's only wing still in operation. Thousands of Copenhageners and tourists still visit it to see its unique pastel coloured walls. 

Bispebjerg Cemetery is one of the architectural landmarks included in the programme of the Open House Copenhagen architectural event (25th - 26th March 2023). Developed in collaboration with the Danish Architecture Center, the event is part of the celebrations in honour of Copenhagen's official designation as World Capital of Architecture for 2023. 

You think that a columbarium is not an optimistic place and can't therefore be compared to pastel Haute Couture gowns and fantasy foods? Well, a columbarium may not be an optimistic place, but a softer palette in graveyard design can instill a sense of calmness and peacefulness in the heavy hearts of those ones paying a visit here to the dear departed, providing them with a healthy dose of strength to get on in life.

Image credits for this post

Images 4 - 7 in this post courtesy of Kew Garden © Roger Wooldridge

The Shunya as the Path to Infinity: Gaurav Gupta Haute Couture S/S 23

There are designers who become instantly famous and get invited to present their creations at prestigious fashion weeks and trade shows almost immediately after founding their own houses. Things worked differently instead for Gaurav Gupta.

After graduating from London's Central Saint Martins College of Art and Design, Gupta founded his label in 2005 in India. He grew his business with his brother, opening boutiques in major Indian cities including New Delhi and Mumbai. But things weren't easy considering that, while he used in his designs Indian craftsmanship techniques, his collections were always concept-driven and he also tended to diverge from more traditional Indian styles and palettes.

As the years passed, though, he managed to find a way to rein in his more conceptual side and come up with what he defines "wearable concepts" (including his personal take on the sari gown that he updated with draped, knotted and plaited motifs).

A favourite among the Bollywood elite and Indian socialites, he has more recently been expanding in the West: American retailer Neiman Marcus is set to offer the brand's designs, and a variety of stars, including Cardi B, Megan Thee Stallion and Lizzo, have already appeared at red carpet events wearing his creations (Gupta conceives the chances he got of dressing celebrities not as commercial opportunities, but as "cultural collaborations"). The designer was also selected for the first time this year to show on the official Haute Couture calendar in Paris.

There were different inspirations behind his S/S 23 collection, but the starting point was the "shunya". The Sanskrit word indicates the concept of nothingness and Indian scholars from the 5th - 2nd century used it to refer to zero.

Shunya is the path to infinity and this philosophical concept, combined with the designer's will to explore space and time, resulted in a series of sculptural greige pieces made with hand-loomed and hand-woven tissue fabrics characterized by graphic architectural volumes with swirls of fabrics enveloping the models' bodies, extending or altering their silhouettes.

Some of these looks seemed to defy gravity, creating suspended waves above the models' heads or wing-like structures.

Infinity was represented by a double dress (Gupta also makes bridal-wear and you can bet that this look will become a favourite at same-sex marriages, but it could also be a great idea for twins...), a conjoined design donned by two models holding hands and representing unity in a sort of tornado cloud of swooping fabrics perfectly symbolizing shunya as a moment of restlessness, a place when the old no longer exists but the new has not emerged and everything is in potentia.

The subtle palette then made way to a brighter one with bright blue gowns paired with matching legging-boots. The colour may have been a reference to covellite (also known as covelline), a rare copper sulfide indigo blue mineral. Another inspiration behind this collection is indeed volcanic erosion.

The latter seemed clearer in black dresses and suits with nude-illusion tulle inserts and embellishments strategically placed: in some gowns the graphic black lines looked like scribblings, but in those designs in which the black revealed yellow or gold nuances underneath, the effect called to mind intrusive igneous rocks formed when magma cools slowly beneath Earth's surface and crystallizes.

The gold or lime sequins breaking through the black reminded of peridotite crystals (consisting of small crystals of olivine, pyroxene and hornblende) breaking into rocks.

The neon yellow dresses with tubular elements covered in sequins were instead a reference to the kundalini snake, a symbol representing the spiritual power and enlightenment that lies within all people.

As a whole, it was a promising first show, but some editing is needed: gowns in stretchy silver or black fabrics were unnecessary and risked of cheapening the collection, drawing attention away from more intricate, sculptural and architectural designs.

Evolution of the Stereotypical Ballgown, From Familiar to Absurd: Viktor & Rolf Haute Couture S/S 2023

We do live in a complex world, that's undeniable, a world too often filtered by contrasting impulses - think about the elation of a high fashion show versus the anxieties generated by a war in the heart of Europe reaching its first anniversary. Can this tension between different forces and the sense of alienation we live in be represented on the runway? Yes, at least according to Dutch fashion house Viktor & Rolf.

Things started off pretty normal at their runway at Paris' Intercontinental Hotel showcased during the local Haute Couture week. Models walked down the runway wearing classic tulle ballgowns (matched with satin-encrusted Christian Louboutin heels) that you may have seen on Ava Gardner or Gina Lollobrigida in the '50s.

You could have ticked off all the elements and features that made the designs fall into the Haute Couture category: bare shoulders; constructed bodice embellished with sequins and bows; accentuated waist; ample multi-layered tulle skirts; pastel colours evoking the works of 18th-century French painters François Boucher and Antoine Watteau, as explained by the press release. Everything was delicate, soft and feminine; nothing was extremely revolutionary, but everything conformed to the stereotypical category, at times verging towards the boring.

But life is a continuous surprise and, suddenly, everything changed and the ordinary turned into the absurd and the uncanny (something announced by a peach gown that from the front looked like a conventional one, but, sideways, revealed a very different reality View this photo).

Gowns retained their shapes and construction, with the same bodices and the multi-layered skirts, but, freeing themselves from human constraints like fashion(able) symbionts, suddenly flipped and rotated on the body of the models who were left in their beige corsets and ended up walking next to gowns, or wearing them positioned at off angles.

In one case a gown was worn upside-down as if it were defying gravity: it engulfed the model, concealing her face and finishing at the top of her thighs. In another a model donned a gown horizontally, showing a black hole in the middle of the torso, giving the impression of a dress viewed from above.

In most cases, it looked like an uncanny collision between a model and a dress had occurred, or it may have also been a vision generated by a naughty Artificial Intelligence responding to a prompt in a Text-to-Image application.

Called "Late Stage Capitalism Waltz", the collection was meant to provide a visualization of the sense of alienation. The title referred to (and showed the consequences of) a dramatic disconnection between image and reality. The inspiration for this collection came indeed from a double vision of the world – IRL and filtered through our phones. After taking a picture, we are indeed able to transform it, maybe use filters to distort shapes and silhouettes and change the reality.

The second disconnection Viktor Horsting and Rolf Snoeren hinted at was a metaphorical one and was based on juxtapositions: traditional couture (soft colours, sculpted silhouettes) and modern-day couture (the realm of experimentation and at times of very weird experiments), possible wardrobes vs impossible ones and impossible fantasies or nightmares becoming possible.

Then there was a final disconnection generated by the cruelest disconnections in the world we live in: we are indeed able to look at a fashion show in glee, mesmerized by colours, embellishments and grand volumes, we enjoy watching extraordinary makeup tutorials and travel videos showing wonderful locations, but, in the same feed, we may get daily doses of apocalyptic news from all over the world.

Apart from couture skills, there was a technological aspect behind it all - 3D printing - used for the dress structures and the bodices (that were 3D-printed in collaboration with Hans Boodt Mannequins).

After Schiaparelli, Doja Cat was also at this show, minus the blood red crystals, but sporting a mustache and goatee made of false eyelashes. This was a minor absurdist touch compared to the inverted and rotated gowns symbolising our topsy-turvy world in tumult and collective alienation, but it retained a touch of irony that went well with the show. After all, the most common purpose of irony is to create humor and point out the absurdity of life.

When a Silent Siren Screams: Iris Van Herpen Haute Couture S/S 23

Amazing creatures hide in the depths of the sea: mysterious jellyfish, like the Chirodectes maculatus, fish with transparent heads such as the Macropinna microstoma, and iridescent worms known as Peinaleopolynoe. Among these fragile and delicate deep-sea creatures there is also the Chrysomallon squamiferum, or sea pangolin, a snail covered by an armour-like structure, that allows it to live several miles below the ocean surface. This dichotomy between the fragility and the strength of deep-sea creatures adapts to the moods of Iris Van Herpen's S/S 23 collection.

In a previous Haute Couture collection (A/W 2021), the Dutch designer explored air, testing one of her creation on an elite skydiver in a 300-kilometer-per-hour fall to earth.

So, for the S/S 23 season it made sense to move onto (or rather "into" in this case...) water (an element that already appeared as an inspiration in Van Herpen's designs and during the A/W 17 show when Danish underwater group Between Music, played crouched in water tanks).

Most fashion presentations have returned to a pre-Covid-19 format, but Van Herpen opted instead to show the new collection with a film. For the occasion, the fashion designer worked with French dancer, choreographer and free diver Julie Gautier.

Shot near Padua, Italy, at the Y-40 pool, the deepest salsobromoiodic thermal water manmade pool in the world (the maximum depth is 42,15 meters), the film is not your average water choreography.

In the short film there aren't indeed synchronized swimming movements forming angular body geometries à la Esther Williams, but a series of underwater delicate choreographies executed by dancers on original music by composer Miranda Vukasovic. The collection was tested in water in the studio and resisted pretty well while filming; Van Herpen's team also followed the dancers in the water to make adjustments to the garments and ensure that everything ran smoothly.

The film opens with the dancers in laser-cut bodices on nude bodysuits: some of the fragile bodices integrate trails of printed silks or strands of hair (this is the first time Van Herpen employed real and synthetic hair in her designs) that recreate the fins of the most delicate goldfish or the tentacles of an octopus. A variation is represented in the video by dégradé silk or polyester gowns replicating the colours of rare jellyfish.

Yet there was a twist in all this underwater fragility: a while back Gautier shot a touching film entitled "Ama”" in which, moving from a personal painful experience, she gracefully danced underwater on Ezio Bosso's "Rain In Your Black Eyes". Gautier dedicated that film to all the women of the world.

Van Herpen must have had in mind that video while working on this collection and developing the accompanying presentation.

Towards the end of the film Gautier dances in a corset with human and synthetic hair in vivid red attached to it that envelop her in a blood-like cloud. For an instant she remains suspended in the water, she looks as if she were flying or maybe ascending to heaven, and finally releases a silent screem that comes out as bubbles of air, before returning to the surface to draw breath (the still images don't make justice to the choreography as dancing underwater is no mean feat...).

Gautier's choreography is a metaphor for all the women feeling bottled, almost trapped "underwater", while trying to scream and struggling to make their voices heard.

Through Gautier's choreography Van Herpen tried to make a symbolic reference to women in general and to express her solidarity to the protests in Iran that have been going since September 2022, when 22-year-old Mahsa Amini died in the custody of the morality police after they arrested her for being in violation of the dress code for women.

The hair attached to Gautier's bodice was a reference to the women cutting their hair in protest in Iran - a practice cited in Persian literature as a sign of protest, anger or mourning. 

Going underwater, but still screaming was for Van Herpen a way to represent women's strength and resilience during terrible trials and adversities in an environment where your voice can't be heard.

The designer felt it would have been impossible to represent these feelings and her message for Iran and symbolise strength through underwater fragility with a conventional runway.

Through the film Van Herpen also hopes to remind Haute Couture clients that fashion can be used as a vehicle to create our identity, but also to spread a message and talk about more important topics.

Some of these designs or versions of them will probably reappear at red carpet events at some point, while Van Herpen may not be a lot under the spotlight in the next few months as she is currently busy putting the final touches to the retrospective that will open in November at Paris' Musée des Arts Décoratifs.

While chronicling her experience as a designer, this visual diary of her career will hopefully also inspire visitors to look at fashion from the science and technology perspectives and make them realise there's so much more behind this industry. The trick to discover it is to block out all the noise surrounding fashion and deep diving into more meaningful experiences.

No Animals Were Harmed, Only Dante Was Butchered: Hellish Allegories in Schiaparelli Haute Couture S/S 23

Preamble (yes, I hear you, preambles can be boring, but in some cases they are necessary, so let's get on with this). Dante Alighieri is part of the official curriculum in all Italian high schools. This means that students usually spend three years focusing on cantos from the Inferno, Purgatorio and Paradiso (Hell, Purgatory and Paradise), the three parts forming Dante's most famous work, The Divine Comedy.

The first impact with such work can be traumatic as there are a lot of metaphors and symbolisms to take in. In the first Canto of the Inferno, for example, Dante meets three beasts, an agile an elegant leopard; a statuesque and scary lion and a disquietingly voracious and thin she-wolf.

According to the more conventional interpretation, the leopard represents lust, the lion arrogance and the she-wolf avarice, that is, the most common vices among humanity. Modern commentators state, instead, that the beasts stand for envy, arrogance and greed or for deception, violence and lack of control/moderation (defined by Dante as incontenenza), in accordance with the three categories of sin in Aristotle's ethical theory (used by Dante for his classification of sins in The Divine Comedy). There is even a political interpretation of the beasts, with the leopard standing for Florence, the lion for the French royal house and the she-wolf for the Roman curia of Pope Boniface VIII. 

Some students stall at the beasts, finding all the allegories daunting and boring and eventually giving up on Dante around line 54 of the first Canto. But those who endure will find an infernal world that truly stirs the imagination and conjures up potent images - from blood, mutilations and disembowelment, to lasciviousness and cannibalism, just to mention a few. Practically social media without any filters/bans.

Easy to guess then why fashion designers like the late Alexander McQueen were inspired by the Italian poet and writer (think about McQueen's "Dante" collection, A/W 1996) in their creations. Now, with this preamble in mind, let's go back to Monday when the Haute Couture shows kicked off in Paris.

Social media were on fire as soon as the first images of Schiaparelli's runway were published: Shalom Harlow donned a gown that seemed to integrate the head of a leopard on her chest (seen with the tail of your eye, it looked like one of those images produced by a Text-to-Image AI by collaging the body of a woman with a leopard…).

Irina Shayk instead sported a huge lion head on a black velvet gown (Kylie Jenner in the front row opted for the same look) and a wolf’s head stared from Naomi Campbell's coat, a design that echoed in the long hairs of its fur Schiaparelli's late '30s monkey fur jackets and boleros (View this photo; exotic furs and skins were popular in Schiaparelli's times and were used by many luxury fashion houses).

Most social media users couldn't restrain themselves and immediately posted their outrage, as the photorealistic beasts definitely looked like the work of a meticulous taxidermist.

Most people saw in the gowns, animal trophies and glamorous huntresses and called for animal cruelty to stop. It was actually very difficult to dissent; to use one word dear to Schiaparelli, it was "shocking".

Creative Director Daniel Roseberry eventually explained no harm was done to the animals as they were made with foam, resin and faux fur (videos of the making of the three heads were posted on social media) and also mentioned the main inspiration behind the collection – Dante's Inferno.

The Inferno inspiration was also embodied by rapper Doja Cat: she arrived at the fashion show with her head, face, arms and décolletage covered in 30,000 scarlet red Swarovski crystals (yes, I'm like you, in these situations I always wonder: "who the f*ck counted them?"), and wearing a red bustier and a skirt encrusted with lacquered wooden beads that looked like bubbles of blood boiling.

Dubbed "Doja's inferno" by the iconic make up artist Pat McGrath who created it, it took more than five hours to apply. Was Doja Cat the Devil or maybe a modern Dante (considering that he is usually represented in paintings in his trademark red robe)? We weren't told, but it would have been less banal and more relevant if she had been a female version of Dante.

Roseberry went on to explain that the animals were a reference to the first canto of Dante's Inferno, but he wanted to render the beasts in a surrealist way and create a sort of three-dimensional trompe l'oeil motif on the gowns.

According to Roseberry, Hell was also a metaphor for the torture and tribulations creatives go through, hoping to astonish and surprise people with truly unique creations (so, essentially, all the fears, anxiety and doubts you go through before reaching Paradise...). 

In the show notes, Roseberry stated: "What appealed to me in the 'Inferno' wasn't just the theatrics of Dante's creation – it was how perfect a metaphor it provided for the torment that every artist or creative person experiences when we sit before the screen or the sketchpad."

After the explanation came in, some critics complained about the reactions on social media, but the problem is that when an inspiration is cleverly incorporated in a collection, it becomes easier to understand the meaning of a design. 

In this case the designer just assumed everybody would have got it, but it was a bit difficult for people on social media and, in particular on Instagram, to spot the inspiration as the context wasn't provided, so the lion, the leopard and the wolf didn't give immediate clues about Dante, but had a "Wilma Flintstones Goes to the Oscar" feeling for most social media users.

That said it was somehow difficult to see a coherent "Inferno" path through the collection: aside from the beasts, Roseberry kept on experimenting with silhouettes, coming up with molded and sculpted shapes allegedly inspired by the bottle of Schiap's fragrance, "Shocking!"

Launched in 1937, the fragrance came in a bottle shaped like a dressmaker's mannequin inspired by Mae West's torso and designed by Argentine artist Leonor Fini. Roseberry reinterpreted this shape as an exaggerated hourglass silhouette.

The results of this exercise varied, looking at times unconvincing and a bit disturbing (with just a touch of Viktor & Rolf's power silhouettes in some cases like the tuxedo View this photo).

The collection also included designs that pointed at Dior's Bar jacket, inverted cupcake mini-skirts, a tuxedo and a hand-painted pinstriped navy pantsuit that looked cartoonish and an engulfing quilted coat (somebody please deliver us from the duvet/quilt look, we’ve had enough…) that was corseted in the back (a detail that in the other designs pointed at sensuality, but in this case evoked a psychiatric hospital).

Then there were rigid mother-of-pearl or lemon tree wood (inspired by the marquetry on a sideboard designed by Jean-Michel Frank for the original Schiaparelli salon on Place Vendôme) bustiers/breast plates that impaired the view as they reached the eyeline of the models. At times, these designs were matched with chunky broken glass jewelry.

Talking about accessories, the collection featured shoes and bags with a keyhole (the motif was also placed on gowns around the belly-button area) and the molded-toe platforms that have by now become trademark on Schiap's runways.

Yet, rather than in black and gold, for this season they came in patent leather, or black, beige and brown, colours that ended up conforming the shoes to all the other René Magritte's "Le Modèle Rouge"-inspired designs seen on a variety of runways and collections, from Pierre Cardin's 1986 men's footwear to Comme des Garçons, Alexander McQueen (S/S 2009), Cèline (S/S 13) and Dior's Haute Couture (S/S 18) (not to mention Vibram's FiveFingers by Suicoke x Midorikawa).

Literal Dantesque references seemed to be limited to the beasts, as if, just like negligent students, Roseberry had given up at line 54 of the first Canto and locked himself out of an Inferno that may have provided him with even stronger images.

Other offers included ecru gowns with cascades of tin sequins covered in leather (a hint at Purgatory or Paradise maybe?) and bustiers with exaggerated horned necklines, while the copper head bust on a model's shoulders remained a mystery (Beatrice as an iron maiden? Iron Maiden's "Dante's Inferno"? I'm getting confused, I know...).

The collection progressed without any chance of Dante's wonderment, but with grand black velvet column dresses and beige gowns, plus a rather tame beige slip dress matched with a modern interpretation of Schiap's iconic ruffled gloves.

In a way, there wasn't a climax in the runway, no grand statement about emerging to "see the stars again", as Dante states at the end of the Inferno.

Yes, Roseberry wasn't opting here for a literal interpretation of Dante, but it felt reductive to just stop at the beasts or justify them with Dante's journey (besides, the snow leopard bustier dress was based on an archival design from 1938, so why did he have to justify it with Dante?).

It felt even more reductive not to take the opportunity to use the allegories behind the beasts - lust, arrogance and greed - to move a critique to the fashion industry.

It was actually bizarre, but, here and there, the collection had some genuine Wizard of Oz moments, from the lion to the emerald green gown and a black velvet column dress with an explosion of sequins that evoked the consistency of straw (without forgetting a bizarre picture of the front row with Kylie Jenner, Marisa Berenson, the granddaughter of Elsa Schiaparelli, Diane Kruger and Rossy de Palma that felt like an audition for The Wizard of Oz?)

Who knows, maybe the "Dante's Inferno" label was attached to the collection at a later stage, to spin a good story (this is often the case in the industry - see the Aelita-gate at Givenchy in 2012).

As for the safari huntress-meets-trophy wife gowns (that were meant to be Dante's allegories), while they didn't go down well with ordinary people and while fashion-wise the concept is not extremely new as there have been hybrid designs incorporating large animals (remember Venla Elonsalo, a finalist at the 2021 Hyères Festival, that incorporated plush toys in her designs? View this photo), most fashion commentators praised them.

Animal right group PETA was among the ones approving the collection: its president Ingrid Newkirk stated it was innovative and making a statement against trophy hunting (but, funnily enough, in 2011, PETA condemned Super Mario for wearing a tanooki fur in a video game, as much as that may sound preposterous...).

Quite often outlandish couture creations are welcomed and praised as high fashion is considered as a ground for experimenting. That said, Schiaparelli originally produced arty pieces that were surreal, but were also wearable and very ironic.

Nowadays at Schiap there is no irony, but an exaggeration of forms and shapes that is perversely Instagrammable and not even necessarily new when you actually analyse the less elaborate designs. But kudos to Doja Cat for submitting herself to a grueling 5 hour make up session to come up with that effect. We sincerely hope somebody helped her removing all that stuff from her skin afterwards.

From Striped Pre-Fall 23 Designs to Striped Frescoes from the Middle Ages

It is always intriguing to find coincidences between contemporary collections and art and, at times, spotting a similarity may reveal uncanny or fun connections.

There is a great example in LaDoubleJ's latest collection, Pre-Fall 23. The brand usually gets its inspirations from a rather irritating figure, the Milanese "sciura" (imagine an elegant, wealthy and insufferably snobbish lady), and caters to consumers perennially stuck in a Summer holiday mood, who think that Italy geographically consists of the Amalfi coast and Tuscany.

The brand's new collection features among floral patterns and pineapple motifs a long dress and a jumpsuit with large oblique white and brown stripes. If you know your stripes, the colour combination and the dimension of the pattern in these designs will immediately ring a bell and point at two things, the attire of Carmelites and the frescoes of the San Domenico Church in Bolzano.

We looked at the former in a previous post, remembering how the Carmelites used to wear a mantle with seven bars, four white and three brown (some say they had a symbolical meaning and hinted at the four cardinal virtues and at the three theological virtues; others, instead, that they indicated the four gospels and the Trinity).The motif represented the scorches left on the mantle of Elijah, who inspired the Carmelites' order, as he ascended to heaven in a chariot of fire.

Michel Pastoureau explains in the volume The Devil's Cloth: A History of Stripes and Striped Fabric that Carmelites were called,''les frères barrés,'' or barred brothers, and that in old French, this term hinted at the marks of illegitimacy.

The cause of derision in Europe as their cloaks deviated from the norm that wanted clothes to be of one colour only, the monks eventually abandoned their striped mantle for a white one (a symbol for the Virgin Mary's purity) in 1287. In 1295 Pope Boniface VIII issued a bill banning striped clothing from all religious orders.

In Bolzano's Church of San Domenico (Dominican Church) there are instead two types of characters wearing a black and white striped attire in the Giottoesque frescoes depicting the stories of Saint Nicholas.

One scene shows the three daughters of a desperate and destitute man, who are dressed in black and white oblique stripes to be initiated into prostitution. The three girls are saved by the intervention of Saint Nicholas who gives them each a golden apple. In their case, their garments with those oblique stripes indicated infamy or lust.

In the same church there are frescoes depicting musicians playing the medieval vielle, an instrument used in different contexts - from troubadour or trouvère songs to sacred conducti.

In this case, though, the musicians, being placed on a lower level compared to the angels above playing sacred music, are probably playing secular music (and they are therefore aligned with more deviant characters wearing stripes in those times, including clowns, jugglers and, well, prostitutes...).

We have so far seen in various previous posts legally dangerous stripes, playful and multi-coloured stripes, architectural stripes and dazzle patterns. Why do we have such a great connection between black/brown and white stripes in the Middle Ages and in our times?

Well, it's not because fashion-wise Carmelites, medieval prostitutes and musicians were ahead of their times (even though we'd like to think so...), but because, while in the past stripes perverted the established order and, according to Pastoureau, disturbed the medieval eye and sensibility (more accustomed to read by levels and therefore confused by stripes), nowadays, they are simply an eye-catching desirable and timeless graphic motif.

You're free to decide if you want to opt for this bold pattern, but, maybe, it's better if you avoid visiting the Dominican Church in Bolzano while wearing large white and black/brown stripes: if other tourists will look at you and at the frescoes and will start laughing, you'll know that the joke's on you.

Fashion as a Stand-Up Comedy Club: Concept Over Clothes at KidSuper

Fashion often takes itself very seriously. Maybe too seriously. For example, nobody ever attempts to laugh while sitting in the front row, to give the impression that what is happening on the runway is tantamount to a sacred celebration, but probably quite a few people occupying those glorious seats are thinking "What the f*ck have I just seen?"

At the same time, while laughing in public at a fashion show is out of the question, there is also a lot of bitching and joking in the industry that goes unseen and unheard by ordinary people.

KidSuper founder Colm Dillane decided instead to turn his brand's A/W 23 runway in Paris into a fun event.

Showcased last Saturday, two days after Louis Vuitton's, where he was guest designer, the collection wasn't presented with an ordinary runway show but with an evening of stand-up comedy, something that aligned with Dillane's out-of-the-box thinking, the collective frame of mind reigning at KidSuper, the New York scene where the brand was founded and America's passion for comedies.

Entitled "Funny Business" and taking place at the iconic Casino de Paris, the one-hour tongue-in-cheek show was hosted by America's Next Top Model's Tyra Banks and featured comedians Fary, Andrew Santino, "Roastmaster General" Jeff Ross, YouTube sensation Stavros Halkias, actress Yvonne Orji, Andrew Schultz, Theo Von, Matteo Lane and J Balvin. Each of them sported one ensemble from KidSuper's A/W 23 collection, while Banks changed several outfits.

Compere Banks donned a variety of suits and coats, many of them with Dillane's illustrations and his trademark embroidered sketches with unravelling faces, while telling stories and recounting tales of her life as a model in Paris.

The jokes - about a variety of topics, people and stereotypes, fashion in general and, more specifically, KidSuper's founder ("KidSuper's clothes are a conversation starter and that conversation usually starts with 'what the fuck are you wearing?'" cracked American stand-up comedian and actor Jeff Ross; Andrew Schultz reminded the audience instead how Dillane, who doesn't have a formal fashion education, started selling T-shirts to people queuing outside the Louis Vuitton flagship, "Now he sells his shirts inside the store," he concluded).

As it happens with real comedy shows, the jokes were rude and filthy, at times unspeakable (well, stand-up comedians are a bit like jesters in a Medieval court, who were the only people allowed to take the piss out of the king…) and there were also jokes about Balenciaga's advertising-gate, Alexander Wang and Kanye West, among the others. Fearing legal issues, most outlets decided not to reprint them, while Dillane will edit the video before putting it online to avoid any problems of a legal nature.

Dillane's camouflage face print, already seen at Louis Vuitton’s appeared also on this stage, as did the arty motif for his successful "kissing" bag with two faces kissing, a trick replicated also on coats and on a puffer, while Dillane sported a burgundy suit embroidered with the Casino de Paris' facade.

The show - that also launched a shoe line in collaboration with Stuart Weitzman, and an edition of jewelry with Vuitton's Artistic Director of Watches and Jewelry Francesca Amfitheatrof's own line, Pauer - was high on body positivity.

Indeed, Dillane had to adapt his garments to the shapes and silhouettes of the comedians involved, but it wasn't so high on the looks that were often repeated, maybe betraying a lack of time as the designer was busy working on Vuitton's show.

The designs also posed a dilemma: some pieces were made with the same techniques seen on Louis Vuitton's runway. Now, while materials may be different and Vuitton's quality may be higher, the essence is more or less the same, which takes you to the question, if you're a fan of this style, why should you buy a piece from Vuitton's collection when you can buy a cheaper one by KidSuper? The dilemma remains even though some motifs for Louis Vuitton will be exclusive to the fashion house.

Though this is the first time a collection is presented via a comedy show, some critics complained about the fact that, in our age, concept is pushed over clothes. Yet, this is Dillane's modus operandi: the designer always eschewed the conventional runways, coming up with disruptive presentations such as an art auction, a pilot TV show, and a stop-motion show.

The one-hour comedy format actually fits perfectly to our times as it is popular on streaming services like Netflix and you get a feeling that Dillane's idea may have the potential of turning up into a mini-series poking fun at the fashion industry.

After all, there would be several hours of comedy about the pretentiousness of modern press releases (but don't dare criticizing them as a scholarly elite of super educated people would get offended…), obnoxious fashion press officers and bizarre runway shows. Looks like Dillane may be in fashion right now, but he may be simply using it as a vehicle towards other outlets or as a way to expand into other industries.

The Child is the Father of the Man: Louis Vuitton Men's A/W 23

"The child is the father of the man" stated William Wordsworth in his 1802 poem, "My Heart Leaps Up," also known as "The Rainbow."

The late Virgil Abloh, the artistic director of Louis Vuitton's menswear collection who passed away in November 2021, aligned with Wordsworth's vision, as he often searched for the child within the adult in his collections.

This theme was evident in the set design for Louis Vuitton's A/W 23 menswear collection, showcased in Paris last week.

Designed by French directors Michel and Olivier Gondry (who also did a film for the occasion), the set recreated rooms in a house that belonged to a grown up, but that still bore traces of the child who had inhabited them (show notes also mentioned rites of passage and teenage bedrooms). These two identities were symbolised by a cartoonish poster on a bedroom wall: it featured two buildings shaped like the initials of the brand, but the architectural inspiration was subverted into a childish drawing as the poster was characterised by vividly bright colours.

This collection was the effort of a collective including KidSuper founder Colm Dillane. A runner-up at the 2021 LVMH Prize for Young Designers, New York-based Dillane, combined his ideas with Vuitton's in-house team.

Dillane's paintings were recreated as tapestry-style jacquard motifs and incorporated in the collection. His camouflage face print, proved the most desirable: already a hit among many celebrities, it appeared here on jackets, coats, backpacks and Keepall bags, and was also recreated in a hyper luxury variation in a suede jacket.

Dillane's more elaborate paintings of domestic interiors were instead reworked into extremely detailed patchworked tracksuits, designs that contrasted with more sober offers.

Some of Dillane's coats incorporated digital glitch effects and there were flashes of dazzle patterns in a tweed suit and coat and surrealist twists in the jackets and coats cinched at the waist by an extra pair of sleeves.

Another theme for this collection was connectivity and the different souls of the in-house team and Dillane gelled together in some original yet not terribly commercial designs.

We are addicted to emails and direct messages on social media that give us the chance to reach out somebody in real time in just few seconds, but Dillane asked members of the multicultural design studio to go back to pen and paper and write letters in their mother tongues.

The letters were then embroidered and stitched onto a suit (you can bet that the mille-feuille letter suit will be a hit with museums and with the odd celebrity) or recreated in leather and then stacked to form a fully functional and very original bag (more commercial than the suit, but probably extremely expensive if it will ever be produced). One jacket featured the classic criss-cross pattern of wall letter holders with two envelopes and three letters spilling out.

As a whole it was a grand and energetic spectacle, but it was also very distracting: the space where a runway takes place is of vital importance and often complements a collection, but here there was a lot to take in between the detailed set design, the garments and accessories, a performance by Spanish singer Rosalía and an illustrious guest list with celebrities, actors and musicians all rigorously clad in Louis Vuitton.

What will happen to Vuitton after this show? The company has been without a creative director of menswear since Virgil Abloh passed away.

Elaborate sets and shows by the in-house collective team became the norm afterwards and now everybody wonders when and if Dillane will eventually get the job (was the young designer answering the question with the slogan "Blurry Vision of a Bright Future" on a gray coat?).

Undoubtedly, he has the energy, the stamina and the passion to do so having worked hard to get there even though he didn't have the connections Abloh had. That said it wouldn't be so bad to keep on having a collective and Dillane rather than a single designer.

Stress would be diluted in this way and Dillane would be able to dedicate enough time to Louis Vuitton's menswear line and to his own brand (that is more time-consuming as he works on every aspect there, from the paintings for the prints and textile elaborations to entertaining relationships with the factories).

At the same time, a collective with a guest designer like Dillane means that the collections will keep on displaying clashing moments and lack coherence (in this case Dillane’s exuberance and his bright colours contrasted with a more rigorous approach). And in case he gets appointed, how long will Dillane last at Vuitton? Time, as usual will tell, but fashion may be just a chapter in Dillane's life: he seems more interested in art and has a penchant for storytelling, something that makes you suspect that he would write a successful novel if only he tried.