Space travel according to Louis Vuitton

Last night Paris Fashion Week came to an end, and did it with a bang thanks to the Louis Vuitton show by Nicholas Ghesquière. The French fashion house pulled off a very Beyoncé & Jay-Z moment by inviting the guests to the Louvre Museum, turned for the occasion into a transparent and futuristic catwalk, with even a pool at the centre. 

As for Demna at Balenciaga, this season the topic of future seems to be very important for many designers. Ghesquière said that for this collection he wanted to explore the edge between the virtual reality we experience through our social media and real life. That was played out via 1980s silhouettes, molder gummer items, space suit sleeves, Memphis Group prints, all in the almost anachronistic frame of futuristic Louvre. 

The show opened with a jacket that must remind you of the Self Drying Jacket worn by Marty McFly in the second movie of the Back to the Future franchise: the big sleeves, similar to the ones of a spacesuit, were manifactured to result very light, and became a leitmotiv throughout the show.

The bright coloured graphics covered mini dresses (the lenght of pants and skirt would rarely pass the knee), ultra girly shorts, long T-shirts worn with pink cargo pants, one-shoulder asymmetrical dresses. Of course the collection included also more tailored pieces, real Louis Vuitton trademark, like blazers with exaggerated shoulders (those 80s vibes again), pinstriped pants and white turtlenecks worn underneath candid jackets. Ghesquière played with the gender-fluid theme, bringing on the catwalk androgynous and slim models, who would wear items taken from the men's closet. After a couple of cocoon coats in leather, it was the turn of actual sculpture dresses, with a structure that recalled a kind of ultra modern cage, that seemed actually quite comfortable. 

A special focus must go the accessories. Pointy high heeled boots in crocodile or reptile leather, with lateral buckle or laces, belts that look almost like a steel wire to brighten and break the silhouette, space capsule evening bags, always in the most esteemed leathers, egg-shaped minibags with the monogramm print all over.

But it was above all the headgear to draw the most attention, especially from The Handmaid's Tale fans. Flat on the head, they frame the face to then get longer on the neck (like those safari hats), but they're stiff, a kind of reworking of the caps worn by Offred.  

Nicholas Ghesquière created something innvative, new and contemporary, without looking back at his past collections and without looking at the work of other designers, but just by being guided by his own passions and instinct. The LV runway was undoubtely one of the most interesting shows seen during this Fashion Week month, at least because it came up with something really different.