In July of this year, Balenciaga opened a new flagship store in the heart of Melbourne's luxury fashion precinct. The expansive 319-square meter Collins Street space presents a range of men’s, women’s, and kids’ ready-to-wear, shoes, bags and accessories while enveloping clients in an assemblage of transport inspired themes and finishes. The floor, covered in both slate grey and bright teal logo-carved carpet, is punctuated with furniture inspired by transport waiting areas, creating a dichotomy between elements associated with public and private settings.
The careful placement of industrial-grade displays creates a mirror effect between the grey and teal sections of the store, accentuating an architecturally telescopic illusion visible from outside. Behind glass, vertical venetian blinds that match the carpets contrast with a seating configuration resembling poured concrete blocks in city parks, making themes of civic centers and domestic interiors the backdrop to the latest Balenciaga collections.
Collections such as Balenciaga Winter 20, which recontextualizes the structures inherently associated with desire while inverting the values of certain dress codes now fill the space with a mix of classical traditions, hardcore aesthetics, and fetishized details.
While neo-gothic dressing looks back and forward at the possibilities of menswear, layering floor-length skirts and caped coats, the Bodybuilder “made-to-measure” fits have created oversized, anabolic suits for all to enjoy. Sport, religion, obsession, and seduction have been stripped of their functions, leaving only the sensation of a fashion object: extravagant, dramatic, erotic, or menacing.
Silhouettes defy convention, accentuating a garment’s technical construction, the body of its wearer, and the space between the two. Exaggerated pagoda shoulders and upright collars are created with technical processes that reinterpret past and present iconography.
The techniques and materials used to make motocross, hockey, or scuba suits inform outfits for every day, softening the hard constructs of protective gear, while the softness of nightgown-like prints and fabrics are pumped up in powerful proportions, quilted, pleated, and layered with jacquard messages. The fictional Balenciaga Football Club places the obsessive quality of team sports in another fanatical context.
Evening streetwear presents minimal, elegant shapes from a patchwork of athletic textures. A modern take on waist-training, stretch materials are thermoformed to create an illusory cinch, eliminating the infrastructure of rigid corsetry. Gala dresses are all-inclusive: shoes, gloves, leggings, and gowns in one piece. Bodywear becomes a second skin, at once obscuring and revealing.
A collaboration with Vibram, the Toe and High Toe shoes twist and elevate an ergonomic innovation. Leather thigh high Texan rainboots provide another option for menswear silhouettes, while the Knife shoe reworks elements of lacey lingerie for the feet.
A sturdy Lunchbox clutch, along with crossbody backpacks and bondage wallets with chained wristlets reference other fetish objects; and in celebration of its 20th anniversary, the Classic Balenciaga bag is reimagined, called the Neo Classic. In the early aughts, the Classic was made especially popular by tabloid stars and super models, solidifying its place in It Bag history.
Officially introduced on the Winter 20 runway, the Neo Classic is at once recognizable as the original Classic and part of the current Balenciaga lexicon. Made of leathers in a range of finishes including crocodile-embossed and spazzolato calf, the Neo Classic bags’ tasseled zip closures, and sharpened edges exhibit both the enduring shape of a modern classic and the unique codes of the House helmed by artistic director Demna Gvasalia.
For more visit: balenciaga.com
Related Features
-
663
-
-
-