Vêtements: the new underground
DEMNA GVASALIA from Georgia decided to hit the fashion world
This article focuses on Vêtements: the emerging label is French by name and location but the creative role is entrusted to the founder Demna Gvasalia, a young Gerogian designer Georgian living and workingin Paris whom I consider to be one of the most interesting names on the international fashionstage. I will mention only one thing from his curriculum vitae that will make everyone understandwhy everyone is keeping an eye on him: he comes from the Maison Martin Margiela (now Maison Margiela) school and he seems to have learned very well the lessons of the great Belgian designer. Gvasalia is setting his own rules, without paying too much attention to trends and markets, to what the press is expecting from him: against all odds this approach, so far from the one used by most of
his colleagues, is taking him far. The silhou- ette of his outerwear, similar to military coats, is nothing short of oversize: the technical capability that enables to create them is really great. But be careful. Because what the young designer does is not a copy of what Margiela was doing fifteen or twenty years ago. This is modern fashion in the most authentic sense of the term, it is underground fashion but without excessive use of black, it is what we expect a young man anywhere in the world to wear because, I repeat, is modern fashion. Although apparently difficult to wear, it strikes me is that these garments at the end are easy to wear because they are well constructed and well made, no small feat in the XXI century, and can be purchased by a range of cus- tomers older than imagined. I think that Vetements is on trend right now just as grunge was on trend in the Nineties: seemingly difficult but then used by all and, most importantly, bought by everyone as everyone invariably wanted those well-worn looking pieces that made one somehow feel good about oneself. Because fashion is, after all, all about making the end customer feel good. And Vetements just does that.