Paris runway season starting one day early with jumbled-up schedule

By

Godfrey Deeny

Published
Jul 25, 2018

The French runway season will start one day earlier in September, with Christian Dior opening the season with an early afternoon on Monday, September 24, according to the official calendar released Wednesday afternoon.

Dior effectively leapfrogs ahead of Jacquemus, the southern  French fashion label, which had been opening the runway action with an evening show these past few seasons.
 
In a charged opening day, Gucci will see out the action with a late evening show in Théâtre Le Palace, the legendary Paris discotheque, which has become newly fashionable. Hedi Slimane staged his 50th birthday party there last Sunday, with a gang of young French musicians and pals – Sacha Got and Marlon Magnée from the group La Femme, and Ulysse Cottin and Armand Penicaut of Papooz – who presented him with a black-and-white cake.

Slimane’s debut for Céline will be the most watched debut of the international season. It is scheduled for Friday evening at 8.30 p.m., a significant change from his predecessor at the house, Phoebe Philo, who always staged her shows in broad daylight.
 
Two other Paris creation houses, Mugler and Courrèges, will also stage runway debuts by new designers, Casey Cadwallader and Yolanda Zobel, respectively.

Carven, which entered into the French equivalent of Chapter 11, and Vanessa Seward, who was dropped by her backer APC and is searching new financing, will both be absent. Moreover, in a sign that many French houses are beginning to come under business pressures, three venerable labels – Lanvin, Nina Ricci and Lacoste – all currently without designers – will sit out this season.

As previously announced, Japanese designer star Jun Takahashi of Undercover has also exited the women’s runway to concentrate on menswear; but will stage a women’s presentation.

 

However, two houses return to the Paris catwalks, after a hiatus showing their collections in New York; Esteban Cortazar and Cédric Charlier.
 
Paris always prides itself of providing slots on the official calendar for new talent; and this fall there will be four new hopefuls: French label Afterhomework, started by Pierre Kaczmarek and Elena Mottola, a line founded by two French teenagers that has been heavily supported by the Fédération de la Haute Couture et de la Mode, French fashion’s governing body; Anton Belinskiy from Ukraine; Natalia Alaverdian, a Russian whose label is called A.W.A.K.E.; and Swiss brand Ottolinger, by Christa Bösch and Cosima Gadient, who were semifinalists for in this year’s LVMH Prize.
 
All told there will be 82 runway shows in Paris, making it the second largest season on the international calendar behind New York.