By Helen Reid
PARIS, March 10 (Reuters) – Louis Vuitton womenswear designer Nicolas Ghesquière took inspiration from folklore and travel for a fall/winter collection packed with shaggy coats, furry hats and frills, presented in a courtyard of the Louvre on the last day of Paris Fashion Week.
Models marched down a catwalk against a backdrop of jagged green shapes evoking mountains, carrying branches draped with handbags or hoisting huge wicker baskets overhead. One wore a triangular red dress shaped like a tent.
“There are clothes that could transport you freely through the world, like nomadic people, almost – so there was really that idea of this universal folklore,” Ghesquière told journalists after the show. “It’s about the silhouette, it’s about the architecture, but it’s also about collective history, collective images that we all have.”
Guests climbed a stairway to enter the huge glass show space in the Cour Carrée, one of the main courtyards of the Louvre, the world-famous museum that was formerly a royal palace. The stark green set was designed by Jeremy Hindle, known for the dystopian TV series Severance.
Skirt sets in thick check fabric featured paintings of lambs by Ukrainian artist Nazar Strelyaev-Nazarko, while trousers featured fur trim along the seams or ended in frills just below the knee, like bloomers. Accessories included backpacks, both large and miniature, and heels meant to resemble antlers.
Several models sported shearling hats inspired by Central Asia, while jackets and coats had exaggerated shoulders with fur epaulettes or fur sleeves with matching mittens, completely engulfing the models’ arms.
“There were some cameos of some animals you could meet in the mountains, there was a wolf, there was a sheep, there was a rabbit,” Ghesquière said.
Celebrities on the front row included actor Zendaya, K-pop star Felix, film director Baz Luhrmann, and American figure skater Alysa Liu, who won gold at the Winter Olympics last month.
Ghesquiere, womenswear designer at the LVMH-owned label since 2013, is among the few in fashion to have stayed in post as more than a dozen brands changed creative direction.
Louis Vuitton, known for its monogrammed leather bags, has been producing ready-to-wear collections for men and women since 1998 when Marc Jacobs was creative director.
(Reporting by Helen Reid, Editing by Louise Heavens)
