Because the Art Deco archives Bruno Sialelli is working on at Lanvin are already an acquired taste, he has two options: do the polite thing and use it sparingly, or do you open the door to a larger potential audience? Or do you go all in, amplifying it, and securing a possibly smaller but more devoted clientele? Sialelli appears to have chosen the latter. The gilded embellishment, baby robe de style numbers, and cocktail dresses studded like skyscrapers that have been embedded in his recent collections are now as full glitz as that customer could want.
“The majority of the dresses we sold recently were the strongest, like Bella [Hadid’s] Lurex dress from the campaign,” Sialelli explained during a collection preview in his Paris showroom. “The majority of our customers come to us because they want to be supported by glamorous, fabulous products.” They are looking for a more elevated and confident version of themselves.” These facts fueled his desire to push the envelope even further. The designer experimented with Pop-Arty daisy prints, dense tinselling, and motifs from 1940s Batman comics in what he called a “bold and joyful, free, and unapologetic” proposition.
It was a strange combination, to say the least. High-octane glamour has always walked a fine line between good taste and bad taste, and the collection’s clash of Batman-adorned metallic gazar dresses, so shiny they looked wet, and tinselled skirt suits was, to say the least, subversive. Sialelli discussed his vision for the collection by referencing the way animated worlds freely mix styles and cultures. “Like a Pinocchio dream village made up of a Bavarian church and an English house, all mixed together and looking new.” “I love that concept, and I love how it’s used in Batman.” omics.
The superhero appeared in the film thanks to Tim Burton’s 1992 masterpiece Batman Returns, which Sialelli adored as a child. “The styling of the Art Deco through the lens of the film was very interesting to us,” he said, “because fashion is about creating dreams informed by many references to which you can freely relate.” We all need a hero after the pandemic, but wearing him on a cocktail dress may be an unusual move, even for Lanvin’s top-tier glamazons. The reference was most successfully translated into the shapes of Sialelli’s menswear, which is frequently more suited to the childish whims that have previously made for great motifs in his work.
In this case, the Batman universe’s broad-shouldered silhouette drew a Tamara de Lempicka–esque line, making Sialelli’s Lanvin man feel a little more mature. This was echoed by two beautifully cut trench coats that hung off the body almost like evening gowns. If Naomi Campbell has her own Bat-Signal, she was summoned last night: the supermodel closed the show by wafting through the Salle Pleyel in billowing black chiffon like the Caped Crusader.
