Dior, Chanel and Balenciaga Show That Fashion’s Future Lies in Its Past

Last week’s Paris Fashion Week featured several dazzling moments. In a season in which the major fashion houses are favoring stability over risk, several of the most prominent designers chose to return to their house archives, but not as a historical tribute. They sought to give a contemporary interpretation to the codes on which those houses were founded. It was a deliberate return to the sources, as a way of redefining the future. Jonathan Anderson at Dior, Pierpaolo Piccioli at Balenciaga and Matthieu Blazy at Chanel each presented, in his own way, a contemporary and desirable collection.

The Dior show took place in the Tuileries Gardens, on a spectacular runway that resembled a park within a park and evoked the aesthetic of Monet’s paintings of the gardens at his home in Giverny. Designer Jonathan Anderson returned to Christian Dior’s New Look lines from 1947, with a defined waist and full skirts, but did so using modern materials, unexpected layers and contemporary proportions. Almost like a historian, he dismantled and reassembled the founder’s codes, offering an answer to the question of how to renew a fashion house without losing its original DNA. Some of the dresses were sewn from layers of cut petals, a nod to an iconic 1949 Dior couture dress. The BAR jacket, the hallmark of the New Look, appeared in new interpretations, sometimes with chiffon layers and beads in updated proportions. The result was a spectacular blend of French culture, history, femininity and romance, extraordinary craftsmanship and volume.

The Chanel show. A modern presence and a universal spirit (Photo: Getty Images)

Designer Matthieu Blazy presented his second collection for Chanel, and now there is no doubt: after years in which Chanel seemed stuck in time and alienated, Blazy is breathing new life into it and restoring the glow of the past to the French fashion house. His research on the house’s founder, Gabrielle Chanel, produced 1920s silhouettes this time, handled by his skilled hands and given a contemporary, elegant and precise twist. Blazy combines the house’s tradition and symbols, tweed, suits and jackets, with his own abilities, presenting a shift in the house’s classic proportions: a low waistline that lengthened the torso, loose oversized jackets that took the place of the classic jacket. Some appeared in knitted, fluid versions, others sporty with zippers and large pockets. The structured silhouette of Chanel’s classic suits was replaced by a modern presence and a universal spirit, and it is desirable again.

In his second collection for Balenciaga, Pierpaolo Piccioli delved into the sculptural cuts and cocoon silhouettes that defined Cristóbal Balenciaga’s work in the 1950s, emphasizing rounded shoulders and coats with architectural volume. After a decade in which Demna Gvasalia served as Balenciaga’s artistic director and turned it into a provocative streetwear laboratory, changing direction is not easy, and it will take time for Piccioli to steady the ship. For now, he also translated the voluminous cocoon silhouettes into men’s coats, and pillbox hats into women’s versions. Dramatic cape coats, sculptural evening dresses and large collars are also tributes to Balenciaga’s 1950s, when he was called the “architect of fashion.” In a softer language and lighter fabrics, Piccioli seeks to recreate the house founder’s sculptural language, restore the brand’s couture elegance and appeal to a contemporary audience.

The Balenciaga show. Couture elegance (Photo: Estrop/Getty Images)