Givenchy resort 2016 by Riccardo Tisci

There are many things that can be said about the brand and its designer. “Ricky-ticky” (my name for him) has shown us season after season that he might have multiple person disorder as almost every collection is an about face from the previous and this season is no different.

Rarely, if ever, have these eyes seen leopard used in such an unappealing and almost profane way. One really doesn’t care that its use was inspired from some arcane Mapplethorpe photo especially when the end result is so unappealing in every imaginable way. While on the subject of unappealing we should discuss the varying shades of pea green that Ricky-ticky seems to find pleasing to the eye. In my experience there is no one nor any reason to wear this color in any of its varying shades and BTW no one ever heard a client say “oh I look so great in puree of pea green!” actually the color should be the de rigeur shade for prison uniforms or road maintenance crews!

While on the subject of visual offenses, let’s talk about the flounce hems which look like they were never fully attached so in essence the garment looks as if it is unfinished and no this is not deconstructed, this is just plain absurd.  While discussing so called silhouettes, let’s talk about that there was something oddly Marc Jacobs-ian and Wangish (Balenciaga) about the collection.

Now we can speak of what was somewhat appealing and some of which were beautiful. One thing that you learn from seeing 10 years’ worth of Givenchy collections is that Ricky-ticky does have talent. He is a master tailor and when he wants to, he is a superb dressmaker. The rather bland man tailored suits had a pristine almost sterile quality to them. They were razor sharp but mostly generic. Then there was the case of the draped jersey tops, dresses and gowns which were just short of exquisitely rendered and designed and quite a palette cleanser within this “sybillish” collection. The jersey pieces almost had me overlooking that shade of green! An amazingly modern take on sexy and at lack of a better word “ day clothes” was the 3 piece turnout made up of jeans, python blazer and wrapped tied jersey top. New? ... No … but refreshing within this collection and amongst the season in general.

In the eend it must be said AGAIN, no one really gives a crap about your faux intellectual inspirations, the client want wants clothes... clothes that make them feel good about themselves. Designers of this era, for the most part, seem to have forgone any sort of signature that defines their brands and that is sad for any number of reasons. Today we offer lots of unsightly and seemingly generic clothes that happen to be attributed to the “it” brand of the moment. Eventually, and maybe it has happened already, consumers want clothes that are identifiable with a designer and not just another graphic printed tee shirt or another shapeless white dress or another pair of full legged puddling pants.