The Parisian couture week rarely sees a standing ovation. Even more rare is the scream that echoes around the golden halls of the Hotel Salomon de Rothschild while Pierpaolo Piccioli walks on the catwalk following the Valentino collection.
In this season his vision involves a mashup of Greek mythology, paintings from the seventeenth and eighteenth centuries, Pasolini’s films and photographs of Deborah Turbeville and medieval armor. He looks crazy, but the result is magnificent.
Brilliant shades, floral headdresses and fantasy separé, impress the fans of Valentino, with over-the-top designs, perhaps the greatest of a lifetime, but above all is the passion of Piccioli for voluminous clothes (and equally voluminous hair) which actually steals the scene.
A giant brushed back wig, a destructured celadon blue silk dress and an intricate inlaid cloak; this is how the show opens with 63 looks in perfect exaggerated style, typical of the era of the Sun King. It took 1,120 hours to do. The dress is described by Piccioli as “The Renaissance meets Versailles that meets the ’60s, which meets something else” but the truth is much more fabulous: it is not a set of references, but it is the dream of a dress, which it is precisely the role that couture should play, frankly.
Regardless of whether it is made of feathers or taffeta, it is clear that Piccioli has certainly highlighted, in this Valentino Couture collection, his “more and more” approach in dressing the proportions of large volumes, and also seems not to have no intention to slow down.
In fact, here is the model Kaia Gerber appear on the catwalk, in a cloud of pink feathers, impersonating what is probably the current aspect of Versailles, in our wildest imagination.
