シャパレリで、厳しい時代に向けたタフな服

There’s always a tussle between past and present in couture. On the one hand, the fashion-as-artform is reviled as an anachronistic throwback to let-them-eat-cake days where yawning class divides and idle richness were seen as an essential part of the social structure. On the other, with zero-waste, one-of-one production and direct-to-consumer marketing, couture is kind of the blueprint for the most sustainable fashion known to mankind. 

So it can be both, now and then. But what’s its future?

That’s the question Daniel Roseberry decided to tackle with his Autumn/Winter 2025 Schiaparelli haute couture show – and it’ll be interesting to see if it frames the season as a whole, somewhat depleted since Dior skipped an official show (they presented their haute couture with Cruise as former artistic director Maria Grazia Chiuri’s final hurrah in Rome in May), and Chanel is still awaiting the debut of Matthieu Blazy. None of that matters to Roseberry though – he’s focused razor-sharp on Schiap, this season even more than usual. 

“I was on the record saying how disinterested I was in the archive,” said Roseberry backstage. “But it was the right time to go into the archives.” Roseberry was thinking about Elsa Schiaparelli’s past, and how that past can create something new. He called his show Back To The Future, because both Roseberry and Schiaparelli have a sense of humour (he’s played the Jurassic Park theme before), and essentially used the process of delving into history as his grist to mill new looks. 

It’s not only applicable to fashion, this stuff. Roseberry dedicated the collection to the 1930s, “when life and art was on the precipice,” which sounds very applicable to right now, just as that period – brewing conflict, right-wing extremism surging – sounds terrifyingly familiar. So there was, he said, a tension to this offering. The majority of the collection was in greyscale – inspired, Roseberry said, by desaturating images, rinsing Schiaparelli of the often violent colour. Which, really, is how we look at Schiap’s history: through the lens of photography. The opening look, a heavily embroidered, sharp-shouldered jacket and a madcap hat, was peak Schiaparelli, an open archive reference. The language of somebody else, spoken anew.

What Roseberry also did was tackle the history he’s made for Schiaparelli – rather than the tightly corseted silhouettes of the past few seasons, this time he eased up. “I wanted to do less body modification,” he commented. “I wanted it to be intense in a different way.” There was still the body, of course – Schiap is the woman who once padded a skeleton into a crêpe evening dress, a gown that even today seems shockingly modern. In the middle of Roseberry’s black and white ball was a stab of blood red, bias chiffon gowns and a satin dress twisted back-to-front, breasts protruding from the shoulder blades, a throbbing crystal heart laid against the nape of the neck. “There’s a lot of that Dalí era,” Roseberry commented – and in the parade of monochrome, those dresses resembled bodies elegantly flayed to viscera. But they also reminded me of when Joan Collins, as Alexis Carrington Colby Dexter, throws a black and white ball on Dynasty and turns up in a scarlet gown (season 7, episode 11, in case you’re not a fanatic like me). Pop culture meets high culture is very Roseberry.

What was remarkable about this collection – bold, brave, indeed new – was how Roseberry sought to dismantle the house’s codifications, both old and those he’s created for Schiaparelli, in order to shift his aesthetic on. It’s something very few designers have the chutzpah to do. Gone was the gleaming gilt, the shocking pink, the winking humour. In its place was something harder. Tough clothes, for tough times? We’re living through those, and there’s doubtless more to come. Maybe this was Roseberry future-proofing Schiaparelli, his clients, and himself.

There’s always a tussle between past and present in couture. On the one hand, the fashion-as-artform is reviled as an anachronistic throwback to let-them-eat-cake days where yawning class divides and idle richness were seen as an essential part of the social structure. On the other, with zero-waste, one-of-one production and direct-to-consumer marketing, couture is kind of the blueprint for the most sustainable fashion known to mankind. 

So it can be both, now and then. But what’s its future?

That’s the question Daniel Roseberry decided to tackle with his Autumn/Winter 2025 Schiaparelli haute couture show – and it’ll be interesting to see if it frames the season as a whole, somewhat depleted since Dior skipped an official show (they presented their haute couture with Cruise as former artistic director Maria Grazia Chiuri’s final hurrah in Rome in May), and Chanel is still awaiting the debut of Matthieu Blazy. None of that matters to Roseberry though – he’s focused razor-sharp on Schiap, this season even more than usual. 

“I was on the record saying how disinterested I was in the archive,” said Roseberry backstage. “But it was the right time to go into the archives.” Roseberry was thinking about Elsa Schiaparelli’s past, and how that past can create something new. He called his show Back To The Future, because both Roseberry and Schiaparelli have a sense of humour (he’s played the Jurassic Park theme before), and essentially used the process of delving into history as his grist to mill new looks. 

It’s not only applicable to fashion, this stuff. Roseberry dedicated the collection to the 1930s, “when life and art was on the precipice,” which sounds very applicable to right now, just as that period – brewing conflict, right-wing extremism surging – sounds terrifyingly familiar. So there was, he said, a tension to this offering. The majority of the collection was in greyscale – inspired, Roseberry said, by desaturating images, rinsing Schiaparelli of the often violent colour. Which, really, is how we look at Schiap’s history: through the lens of photography. The opening look, a heavily embroidered, sharp-shouldered jacket and a madcap hat, was peak Schiaparelli, an open archive reference. The language of somebody else, spoken anew.

What Roseberry also did was tackle the history he’s made for Schiaparelli – rather than the tightly corseted silhouettes of the past few seasons, this time he eased up. “I wanted to do less body modification,” he commented. “I wanted it to be intense in a different way.” There was still the body, of course – Schiap is the woman who once padded a skeleton into a crêpe evening dress, a gown that even today seems shockingly modern. In the middle of Roseberry’s black and white ball was a stab of blood red, bias chiffon gowns and a satin dress twisted back-to-front, breasts protruding from the shoulder blades, a throbbing crystal heart laid against the nape of the neck. “There’s a lot of that Dalí era,” Roseberry commented – and in the parade of monochrome, those dresses resembled bodies elegantly flayed to viscera. But they also reminded me of when Joan Collins, as Alexis Carrington Colby Dexter, throws a black and white ball on Dynasty and turns up in a scarlet gown (season 7, episode 11, in case you’re not a fanatic like me). Pop culture meets high culture is very Roseberry.

What was remarkable about this collection – bold, brave, indeed new – was how Roseberry sought to dismantle the house’s codifications, both old and those he’s created for Schiaparelli, in order to shift his aesthetic on. It’s something very few designers have the chutzpah to do. Gone was the gleaming gilt, the shocking pink, the winking humour. In its place was something harder. Tough clothes, for tough times? We’re living through those, and there’s doubtless more to come. Maybe this was Roseberry future-proofing Schiaparelli, his clients, and himself.