The scene was set on arrival at the venue for Kenzo’s fall 2018 show. Several film sets were scattered around the vast show space, replete with cut-in-half cars, half dining tables, sliced baths, and film-quality lighting and camera rigs. We thought before the show that this was to be the setting for the finale, where models would sit afterwards so the audience could meander around and snap photos for their Instagrams. We couldn’t have been more wrong.

Kenzo achieved the impossible feat of filming and streaming a live-action film in parallel with their men’s and women’s runway presentations — talk about multitasking! In the show notes, creative directors Carol Lim and Humberto Leon described “a collection celebrating the various on-screen strong women and men who have engrossed or enthralled us with their styles and spirit.” And, in fact, the whole experience was like watching a Greg Araki movie live. Assistants ran around during the show in plain sight, getting lighting or cameras ready, and the actors and principal characters in the film that unfolded in front of us dispersed throughout the venue. 

This was a wonderful performative comment on our inability to wait, whether in filming, sharing, making, experiencing, etc. It seems to us that Kenzo is ahead of the curve, showing both men’s and women’s collections together and putting the spectator in a state of sensory overload.