Balenciaga’s Resort 2023 show happened a week ago, but we let it get lost in the Cannes shuffle. I remember seeing various fashion types on Instagram talking about how funny and clever it was, and… was it? The setting was the New York Stock Exchange, amid all our economic anxieties, and Vogue’s review opens by noting that the designer Demna “has never shied away from darkness or menace, and this show was no exception. Latex bodysuits fully obscured his models’ faces; they were corporate raiders of a different kind.” Here’s the inspiration from Demna’s own mouth:
“We have to trigger emotion,” he said backstage, wearing a face-obscuring mask of his own. “We live in a terrifying world, and I think fashion is a reflection of that… I think it was quite urgent, a quite urgent show.”
Personally, I felt claustrophobic while looking at all those masks. I’m going to take deep breaths now just because I can.
