Review of Dior Fall 2022 Fashion Show
A ‘New Look’ for the Next Era
By Anna Ross
If I may be candid for just a moment, until today, I’d become a little deflated by Dior. I’ve been longing for a “wow” moment, a moment where Maria Grazia Chiuri turns the volume and screams from the rafters. Today was that moment.
Not many shows make my hair stand up on end. From start to finish, this collection delivered newness, poignancy, synchronicity and style in one outing.
This was the very definition of taking a house’s heritage and realigning it for the future. A future that is bound for change, given the current climate, and a future where clothes need to be fit for purpose.
Case in point; the house’s iconic 1940s Bar Jacket, re-designed with a material system that thermoregulates the body’s humidity*, also seen on a bodysuit contoured in fluorescent light that opened the show. Technology for a changing climate – or perhaps just a hot flush!
These tech-touches and innovative material-plays were intercepted throughout. The house’s Roger Vivier pumps came re-appropriated via a technical fabric yolke around the ankle paired with embroidered hosiery that added a welcome eclecticism that I hadn’t seen in the designer’s handwriting before.
Similarly, belts with multiple pockets and exquisite overlay corsetry came designed to be layered over jackets, tops, t-shirts – take your pick – the new Dior is destined to work with your everyday essentials.
Speaking of everyday essentials; the designer delivered outstanding denim, some in slick blue and others more decorative patterns, with a nod to today’s street style looks du jour in straight legs and cropped bomber jacket silhouettes. Flipping the narrative once more, materials borrowed from menswear made for hi-low pleated skirting, the same effect transcending into evening wear in sheer trapeze gowns, one of them glistening with iridescent rainbow embroideries.
Protection and perception were central to the show’s theme and production, exquisitely created (as ever) by Bureau Betak. Surrounding the audience, hundreds of portraits of women from the 16th-19th century, reimagined by artist Mariella Bettineschi, their features cut up and collaged with stacked up eyes, their names removed by means of a white box, realigning their gaze and showcased to question the judgment that has conditioned them – then and now.
The work, entitled “The Next Era,” was a fitting title for what feels like a whole new world for not only women but for everybody – and indeed – a shiny new chapter at Dior.
*using innovation by D-Air labbb**