Can you make surrealism real? That is the question for the house of Schiaparelli. The Paris couture house founded by Elsa Schiaparelli almost a century ago has launched its first collection of ready-to-wear clothes and handbags. For a label that has always celebrated the fantastical rather than the wearable, it is a concept almost as far fetched as Elsa Schiaparelli’s famous hat in the shape of an upturned shoe.
Yet despite its long history of eccentricity, there is something very modern about this fashion house. The aesthetic is emoji-like, all lobsters, hearts and eyes. Schiaparelli designed the first jumpsuit, in 1930, and was the first designer to set a catwalk show to music. It was Schiaparelli and her friend Salvador Dalí who invented the art-fashion collaboration, as currently espoused at Calvin Klein and Raf Simons with US artist Sterling Ruby. (Legend has it that Dali wanted the lobster-embroidered evening gown he and Schiaparelli created to be displayed in the salon with a dressing of real mayonnaise, but he was overruled.)
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