Power of the Pen: Walter Van Beirendonck Men’s Fall 2015
In his fascinating career as a menswear visionary and renegade, Walter Van Beirendonck has often acted as a moral and social conscience in the fashion world, raising awareness about our planet’s wounds, plagues and injustices. True to form, he opened his fall 2015 show — which he held, paradoxically, in the bourgeois salons of the Hotel d’Evreux on the Place Vendôme — with clear plastic tunics closed at the back, doctor-style, with the words “Stop terrorising the world.” Clearly a reference to the terror attacks in Paris earlier this month.
Then he took different paths, showing pants with visible selvedge at the waist, beautiful Ikat-inspired coats with a cartoonish effigy of himself, the ultimate gay bear, posing among some jungle fauna. There were also naughty brooches with eagles carrying butt plugs. The final pieces were the most arresting: jackets, sweaters, and capes that were a fascinating mixture of fur, plastic, and jutting tulle.
