Ephemeral Shrouds Haunt Maison Margiela's FW20 Artisanal Collection
The pantheon of Greek gods inspire delicate opaque draping.
Maison Margiela‘s artisanal presentations are couture in its purest form, eschewing all stylistic cues aside for creative director John Galliano‘s far-flung inspirations. Attention to detail and painstaking craft inform the resulting garments’ ethos, which keeps in line with founder Martin Margiela‘s predilection for striking out against the grain.
Recicla — the name given to Maison Margiela’s signature upcycling approach — informs a portion of this Artisanal collection, seeing classic menswear pieces torn apart, haphazardly pieced together and reversed with jarring effect. Large branded tags grace the ravaged hats and gowns in one of the few contemporary touches. Elsewhere, Galliano leans on circular cutting — a technique that he associates with a current inspiration, 1980s’ New Romantics — to evoke eras-old marble sculptures with the wet drapery appearance of the filmy voile that shrouds models named after gods in Greek mythology, like Plutus, Eros and Calliope.
Below, watch a sample from Maison Margiela and SHOWStudio‘s corresponding S.W.A.L.K. project, soon to arrive on the house’s YouTube channel.
Elsewhere during Digital Paris Fashion Week, independent brands issued their own adventurous film projects.
