WHOEVER said fetish and glam don’t go together simply hasn’t seen the AW20 presentation of Saint Laurent by Anthony Vaccarello at Paris Fashion Week. At first glance, everything in Vaccarello’s collection is very in tune with the overall AW20 trends – a lot of bourgeois, a dash of equestrian, and an abundance of tailored blazers. However, in a very Yves Saint Laurent move, Vaccarello added a little spice to his collection – and that spice was latex.
“I wanted to find the balance between control and abandonment, the tension between discipline and pleasure that defines the modernity of Saint Laurent. For Saint Laurent, elegance is mandatory, but it also goes with perversity,” explains Vaccarello. Perversity in his collection however is perversity as one might imagine it. Instead, it became a creative solution to bring a undertone of danger and excitement into the AW20 trends.
Inspired by 1990s, Saint Laurent’s AW20 collection followed elegant and well-behaved bourgeois designs, including superbly tailored tweed jackets, pussy-bow blouses, neckerchiefs and jabot necklines. The collection saw a fusion of colours, patterns, and accessories, while Vaccarello’s addition of latex made the looks even more visually stunning.
For those, who are unsure whether to wear shorts or trousers, Saint Laurent offered a creative solution. This year the house decided to resurrect the culottes, which Vaccarello then paired with latex leggings, keeping it in with the fetish-meets-glam theme.
Enormous faux furs also had their moment during the AW20 show. Presented in bold turquoise, black and blue hues, these oversized faux fur coats also make a great addition to the latex focus of the collection.
Vaccarello’s AW20 collection ticked every box in Saint Laurent’s fashion guidebook: it was elegant and classical yet thrill-seeking and dangerous. Saint Laurent’s girl has always been representative of a power woman, in control of what she is doing and confident in expressing her sexuality. And this years’ AW20 collection expressed exactly that – glamour with a heavy sense of sensuality and unapologetic expression of identity.
by Lexi Fadina