His Chanel collections worked
patterns on flowing and fitted dresses in dark to light hues, gave way to Hermes kelly 32cm baghumorous touches such as large "portfolio" bags, painted Chanel handbag logos, and a rucksack with large wooden brushes poking out. But the true artistry in this collection came in the form of numerous designs that played subtly on the styles of Scottish bagpipers — showing the depth of Lagerfeld's constant evolution. Chanel in contrast, because Karl Lagerfeld’s early Chanel collections often caused a similar storm of controversy. His resuscitation of Chanel was through “shock treatments”, blowing the Chanel chain trims to jumbo size, the pearls to the scale of golf balls, marrying the Chanel tweed with leather and denim. It had nothing and everything to do with the heritage of the house of Chanel.
Ultimately, however, Lagerfeld is a great designer, not a great stylist. His Chanel collections worked – and continue to work – because they are great fashion. The spring collection he showed this morning was the perfect example. Lagerfeld kitted out the Garnd Palais as a fake art gallery, filled with fake artworks. They were all Chanel-isms, but seen by the likes of Claes Oldenberg, Cy Twombly, Allen Jones or Andy Warhol (he actually did silkscreen a No. 5 bottle, so there was precedent). US government shutdown dragged deep into a fourth day, with House Speaker John Boehner fuming: "This isn't some damn game." President Barack Obama meanwhile digested an embarrassing blow to his foreign policy and the US image abroad after he was forced to cancel plans to jet to Asia for a pair of vHermes new constance bagdiplomatic summits.
The arty-farty stuff made a great backdrop, but didn’t infect the clothes too much, bar a few quilted Chanel art portfolios and the male model Marlon Teixeira toting a graffitied backpack with paintbrushes sticking out. There were flap-fronted blouses and jackets, Perhaps channeling Chanel's acclaimed Arts and Hermes passport holderCrafts show in Edinburgh last December, the designer used the black-and-white spats of Scottish pipers to inspire great stocking shoes. Elsewhere, he crossed traditional Chanel skirt suits with a frayed tartan pattern, and many of the looks sported cape silhouettes as worn by pipers. Even the diagonal crossover of tartan fabric that Scots band across their chests was evoked when Lagerfeld dropped the collar off one shoulder. Where does the 79-year-old find the energy to produce such new ideas season upon season?