Photo Credit: Courtesy of Dior
Dior presented a glamorous 1920s-inspired spring/summer 2023 collection for their haute couture show this year in Paris. For Maria Grazia Chiuri, each haute couture collection is an opportunity to explore the complex thought processes connected to a garment constructed for a body – viewing it ultimately as a body manifesto. Josephine Baker and other inspiring women from the ‘20s serve as the main point of inspiration for the collection.
For a bit of history, Josephine Baker was an African-American singer and dancer who left the United State in the mid-1920s to move to Paris and to become a cabaret singer. She became a glamorous icon who used clothes as a tool to combat racial stereotypes and prejudices. As her fame grew, Baker became a notable client at Dior. An early civil rights activist, Baker utilized fashion as an asset for cultural change.
Photo Credit: Courtesy of Dior
Baker’s cozy, intimate dressing room that precedes her stage entrance is evoked in the collection through a series of coats reminiscent of the bathrobe, which conceals and protects. Made of light velvet, crumpled and dynamic, or quilted, they open onto pieces of light satin underwear that are transformed into protagonists themselves as Chiuri turns them into evening wear, their powered hues and black providing a contemporary interpretation of 1950s classics.
The clothes glide over the body and caress it. In silk and velvet, often with a creased effect. Delicate embroidery, tiny silver studs, and sequins occupy the space and absorb runway lights to reflect onto the audience. Fringes in shades of silver and gold accompany and magnify the choreography of the movement sketched by the body. The suits and coats pay tribute to the masculine fabrics dear to Monsieur Dior. The length, always above the ankle, reveals shoes with heels and imposing soles.
Photo Credit: Fiona Torre
Photo Credit: Fiona Torre
The show’s staging by African-American artist Mickalene Thomas celebrates black and mixed-race women like Baker, who evolved into powerful figureheads by breaking the racial barrier, with giant portraits. She unveils the deep meaning of the collection and shakes up the vision of haute couture, the essence of fashion that can become a radical gesture of awareness of its own value and strength.
Photo Credit: Laura Sciacovelli for Dior
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