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12 The Global Edition of The New York Times

Thursday, October 2, 2008 Fashion
Graphic geometry Mining a heritage
From Page 11
Even when the snappy party
dresses came out — and there
were no long gowns — they
sprouted Lacroix’s signature
carnations as a print, but they
were cocktail frocks, not
fantastic couture concoctions.
And true to the sense that this
was a collection in which to find
a modern wardrobe, a central
section was devoted to knitwear,
some of it heavily embellished,
but still approachable.
The designer said that he was
inspired by his native Arles, the
French city where the smash-hit
museum exhibit juxtaposing art
and fashion that he created
seemed to have given him a
relaxed ease with melding brief
touches of historic costume with
modern clothes. Taken at face
value, the show offered the
straightforward ready-to-wear
collection in his image that
Lacroix has been struggling for
years to perfect.
Emanuel Ungaro
Having been thrown into the
deep end at Emanuel Ungaro at
24, Esteban Cortezar is making
forward strides, but looking into
his own South American culture,
as well as the Ungaro archives.
Although most of the clothes
in Wednesday’s show seemed for
the cocktail hour, the Panama
hats perched above frills and
drapes and a white cotton shirt
pairing with a ruffled skirt
suggested a breath of open air
rather than the perfume of a
boudoir.
Forget the poncho, that was
taking his heritage too far, but,
otherwise, Cortezar brought the
color and optimism of both his
roots and his youth to the
collection. The short hemlines,
worn by models perched on pin
heels, may play better in Latin
countries than a gloomy Europe
or a chastened North America.
Bright colors like yellow and
turquoise also seemed suited to
an upbeat economy. But Ungaro
is aiming for a position similar
to that of Balmain — a hit brand
for wealthy young women who
care less about the fine heritage
of Ungaro than about hip party
clothes.
Suzy Menkes is fashion editor
at the International Herald
Tribune.

ANDREW GN iht . com/style

Video: An interview with Andrew Gn on his new made-to-measure line.
Photographs by Chris Moore/Karl Prouse
ANN DEMEULEMEESTER

JEAN PAUL GAULTIER Debuting A mad circus Karma

From Page 11
a new line t was mad, it was manic, it was in

black as a color, showing a raft of vari-

ations according to the reflectivity or
denseness of the color. The only place
where the designer seemed to be tra- By Jessica Michault
I the actual sense of the words a
fashion circus. But with his show
of Indian color, embroidery and
decoration, as if seen through the lar-
ger-than-life movie cameras of Bolly- I
colors
t is a long stretch from the soul-
ful romanticism of Patti Smith to
cing all too familiar ground was when wood, Manish Arora marked his place the fairy tale of a wannabe prin-
jackets were turned back to front — a any might argue that as the first Indian designer to begin to cess. Ann Demeulemeester has
reprise of an old idea.

Karl Lagerfeld
Karl Lagerfeld has always been an
architect for his own line, using linear
structures to differentiate KL from
Cha nel.
‘‘Very graphic — but breaking it up,’’
said the designer backstage, referring
to the straight shapes cut into by
rounded, asymmetric leather corset
belts or even by the perforated leather
cuffs around the ankle.
But this riff on rigor did not cut it, in
spite of some fine effects like metallic
jewelry in ironwork, traced like tattoos
and clinging to flesh.
The show opened with a figure in sil-
houette surrounded by a smoky cloud
on the runway, looking like she was
hologram about to vanish. But like
many missed opportunities for hyper-
modernity, this was just a model in the
spotlight. Although, with his fashion
antennae, Lagerfeld had the same idea
of reflection and absorption seen at
Balenciaga, the KL show Wednesday
apparently was not based on expansive
fabric research or high-tech but was
rather done with familiar materials,
mostly in black, but with a blue or beige
a lternative.
Vertical cones at the waist looked
very familiar: a makeover from Lager-
feld’s previous organ-pipe inspiration
at Chanel but not, this time, playing the
designer’s top notes.
Jean Paul Gaultier
By changing the angle of this fashion
viewpoint, Jean Paul Gaultier had a
fresh start to his show. A trio of dancers
from the EGPC company, where the de-
signer is costume designer for a show
next week, leapt across the stage, bring-
ing a shot of energy that reverberated
through the collection.
Paring down his cheeky tricks, the
COMME DES GARÇONS
KARL LAGERFELD
designer put his models — sta rting
with the Canadian Coco Rocha — i nto
stretch jersey leotards and warm-up
wear in colors that varied from hot to
flesh tones. They morphed seamlessly
into jersey dresses, cut asymmetrically,
creating a liquid geometry that Gaulti-
er, now that he is a fine couturier, made
look as easy as an Olympian high
jump.
The next brief passage of the design-
er’s sharp tailoring was another graph-
ic aspect, although not new for Gaulti-
er. If only the show had ended there, it
would have been a winner. But instead,
Gaultier filled the runway with dresses
filmy, patterned — a this-and-that mo-
ment that messed up the clean lines on
which he had been working, and
drained the show of its early energy.
M it is not the best time
to introduce a high-
end, made-to-meas-
ure fashion line. But that is ex-
actly what the designer A ndrew
Gn did with his spring/summer
2009 collection. The designer
sent down the catwalk 18 looks
from his new ‘‘Atelier’’ line inter-
spersed with his ready-to-wear
pieces.
‘‘My clients have been asking
for it and I really wanted to honor
all the petite mains that work
with me,’’ the designer said back-
stage. If the reaction from those
clients was any indication — sit-
ting together front-row in their
winter Gn designs, checking off
looks from the show list, and
yelling loud enough to be heard
across the catwalk ‘‘There’s your
New Year’s Eve dress’’ — he had
hit the nail on the head.
Gn combined the atmosphere
of India with the style of Helena
Rubenstein to create a collection
that was rich, rich, rich. Rich in
print, with paisley swirls on long
gowns or crafted out of colored
stones on a short white dress.
Rich in color, with outfits cut
from cloth in shades of turquoise,
emerald green, fuchsia, coral and
amethyst — just right for the sat-
urating summer sun. And rich in
embroidery, with every ensemble
getting its own striking embel-
lishments, from the cake-frosting
curls on the opening white jacket,
through the passementerie but-
tons on a silver brocade coat, to
the appliqué of hand-enameled
metal strips to form the outline of
colla rs.
So, even if belt-tightening is in
ever yone’s future, count on Gn’s
clients doing it with one of his be-
jeweled versions.
MANISH AROR A
India to reconsider luxury brand limits
By Astrid Wendlandt
PARIS
ndia pledged to consider a legal
I reform that would help luxury
goods companies gain a more cer-
tain foothold in one of their
biggest untapped markets, potentially
worth $15 billion in annual sales.
During a visit to Paris on Wednes-
day, the Indian trade minister, Kamal
Nath, said he would think about allow-
ing foreign retailers to own 100 percent
of their companies in India, up from 51
percent today.
‘‘We are considering it, seriously,’’
Nath said in an interview on the fringes
of a conference organized by the
Comité Colbert, the French luxury
trade group whose 70 members’ com-
bined sales reach ¤22 billion, or $31.12
billion, annually.
India has been the laggard of emerg-
ing luxury markets because of lack of
retail space, excessive red tape, high
duties, poor infrastructure and the cap-
ping of foreign ownership at 51 percent
build an international brand.
Through his collaboration with Ree-
bok and through his more approach-
able Fish Fry line, Arora is building a
reputation for vivid color, optimistic
design and for making use of India’s
extraordinary handwork. All that was
evident at his third season of showing
in Paris. And if some of those clothes,
like bright built-in bras and a mini-
crinoline dress with a twirling carou-
sel, looked like stage costumes, well,
Arora is trying to find a center-stage
position in the global marketplace.
— Suzy Menkes
since 2006.
Given the political opposition, the
Indian government has been reluctant
to open the country’s retail sector
more.
Nath was pressed by several French
luxury groups Wednesday, including
LVMH Moët Hennessy Louis Vuitton,
Hermès, Remy Martin and Chanel, to
allow greater access.
Louis Vuitton, for example, entered
the Indian market in 2003 and still has
only four outlets there, compared to 25
in China. ‘‘We would like to have the
right to own 100 percent of our retail
company rather than 51 percent today
— that is our request and we will con-
tinue to talk to the Indian authorities,’’
Yves Carcelle, Louis Vuitton’s chief ex-
ecutive, told the conference.
Carcelle said Louis Vuitton was also
one of several luxury goods groups that
found high duties a barrier to establish-
ing themselves in India.
Tariffs on French luxury goods can
reach 500 percent.
‘‘India has an infant and infinite
made that journey, and the place
she found for her summer 2009
collection was full of charm. To
her favorite Edwardian jackets and
bunchy layers of shirt in graphic
black and white, she added karma
colors — saffron, orange and yel-
low. The embellishment seemed to
capture the magic of childhood in
its snowflake patterns picked out
in crystal or as a waterfall of bead-
ing creating an aurora borealis
down the front of a dress. This was
a playful Demeulemeester in fine
form.
— Suzy Menkes
ma rket,’’ Nath told the conference, re-
ferring to luxury goods. He added that
the country was eager to promote com-
petition and fight counterfeiting.
According to a report by the Federa-
tion of Indian Chambers of Commerce
and Industry, the population of high-
net-worth individuals in India stood at
123,000 in 2007, up 22.7 percent from
2006, making India the country with
the fastest-growing population of the
wealthy in the world.
‘‘For the moment, India is a very
small market, but it is a market that has
a very strong potential,’’ Elisabeth Pon-
solle des Portes, chief executive of the
Comité Colbert, said.
The Indian jeweler and manufac-
turer Gitanjali estimated that some 1.6
million households in India earned
$100,000 a year and the luxury market
could reach $15 billion, from $500
milion today.
‘‘India is a very new market for lux-
ur y,’’ said Mehul Choksi, managing di-
rector of Gitanjali.
Reuters