 |
At Ungaro, the Prince is Crowned
PARIS, October 6 - Last summer, when Emanuel Ungaro made the decision to discontinue his couture line, it amounted to the accession of Giambattista Valli as Artistic Director of the house. The Ready-to-Wear line is now the heritage of his name.
I've often thought of Giambattista as a sort of Roman prince. With dark curly hair and smoldering good looks, he's been a good and faithful understudy, finding his way season after season, having fallen into it all in the turbulent autumn of 2001. And today's show, as much of anything, proved that he's got the formula right.
In the course of the 62 piece collection, he showed his mastery of Ungaro's prints and coloring, his understanding of his tutor's meticulous draping, his technique in applying scalloped fringe. But more than that, Giambattista proved that he could inject enough of his own romanticism into the tradition to come out with a new, hybrid bloodline.
The show began with a short film called "infusion" by Marcus Tomlinson, commissioned for the Cultural Olympiad 2004. In artful cinematography, sheets of water encircling a man in traditional Greek costume (a white pleated skirt) broke into a spray of fine droplets.
You didn't have too look hard to see the same idea in the flamenco skirts wisping down the runway, breaking into layers of snowy chiffon pleats. Neither could you miss it in the tops enveloped with accordion strokes, nor in the fringe that cascaded down the sleeves of a day dress.
A delicate golden bolero draped across the shoulders. A jersey swimsuit printed with crimson Chinese flowers. It was Ungaro's traditional language recast with a modern dialect.
Backstage the champagne was flowing, as a relaxed Giambattista greeted well wishers in a small, gray cubicle. "I worked a lot on volume," he explained. "Using the pleats and layering to get at it."
What he didn't say, of course, was that he'd just proven himself at the helm.
Perhaps the eveningwear was the ultimate test - dresses fluttering with gossamer trains, a voluptuous emerald gown splashed with gold and green sequins, a mint-colored ruffled ensemble dissolving into cocktail dress. It was there that the persistent sun-drenched sexiness seemed to percolate; there that the new House of Ungaro was born.
|
 |
|
|
|
