Voice Files

Instant one-sentence-interviews recording the commentary of people that matter.


Alexander McQueen Fall/Winter 2014

"Love the black skirts and long double-breasted coats. Clothes suitable for formal funereal fetes or cold-night dark back alley trysts."

/BRUCE LABRUCE, film-maker

"The stiff, square shoulders are the default here so the militant exits of five or so tailored jackets serve as perfect backdrop for the sporadic appearance of rounded shoulders on cozy cardigans, turtlenecks, and sweaters. 2014 is about hugging yourself. Even the menacing leather coat is lined with plush shearling. Little goth boy has a sweet side, just check his pink plaid."
/IRIS & DANIEL, fashion editors We Have No Style

"I found McQueen to be refreshingly dark."

/MATTHEW ATTARD NAVARRO, founder Platinum Love Magazine

"Stop, isn't that Oliver Bernard? What the fuck. He's the type that would get into drunken fistfights over le mot juste, but at least he'd recite Apollinaire to you in bed after."
/RUDY KATOCH, writer via twitter

"Bleak House. Less posh & polite than McQueen has been for a while. It reminds me of their pre-2000, pre-Gucci menswear; a bit messier, and a bit rawer. McComme?"

/JOHN-MICHAEL O'SULLIVAN, writer 1972projects

"Something has happened and something is happening. Bacon, Freud, McQueen? Intellectual, tailored goth transformations with a subliminal message: teenage angst is back in stock and it comes with a hand-written price tag."
/HORST

AFEW, A New Female

1. Simone Rocha Spring/Summer 2014
2. Meadham Kirchhoff Spring/Summer 2014
3. Marques'Almeida Spring/Summer 2014

The female equivalent to ANEW, A New Male, these three designers are currently defining what womanhood means today. On the forefront: Simone Rocha. She gives us laminated prostitute nuns, shredded millionaire's daughters and confused catholic punk school girls. The anti-image of what women should be. And the ideal image of what women should be.

What Rocha shares with Meadham Kirchhoff is a tendency towards romantic codes: lace dresses, collared blouses, negligee tops. Yet, these codes are broken, smashed into pieces, destroyed and covered by snakeskin and PVC. Or ripped apart. Skirts have holes, tops are gliding down the shoulders. Yet, these dysfunctional conflicts are decorated and embellished. With pearls, with trims, with gold lamé.

The 'decoration of destruction' is also eminent in the designs of Marques'Almeida. The masters of frayed dyed denim and imperfect shreds of finest fabric. Together, these three designers create an eclectic image of women. Outgrown girls who still want to have fun. Women who do not accept grown-up womanhood. Who wants to live forever? They surely do.
/HORST

The Real Winner Of Paris Fashion Week, An Afterthought

Gareth Pugh Fall/Winter 2013

Poetry aside, comparisons forgotten - I will now speak my word and thought, as it is.

The best collection for Fall/Winter 2013, presented during Paris Fashion Week, was - by far - presented by Gareth Pugh. It was a romantic, psychologic and deeply emotional exercise in womenswear, respectively its recurrent icon: the dress.

A balance act of soft and hard, cut and dimension. It felt massive and out of proportion, out of sight with the 'real' world. Women disappeared in grey pyramids of crispy textiles - just to be resurrected again as superhuman goddesses. Similar ideas have been proposed by Junya Watanabe and Thom Browne, and lately also by Maison Martin Margiela or Giles but it never felt as 'right' and logical. The transformation of each look happened so meticulously, one had to look twice to feel the 'difference' - just to arrive at the total other end, in the end.
/HORST

Jut Prance

Balenciaga Spring/Summer 2013

Ghesquière provides another lesson in fashion design. With ruffles that pay homage to the Spanish heritage of Flamenco, constructed so perfectly. Paired with strict suits and cropped bandeau tops, the silhouette ascends from romance towards hyper-minimalsm.
/HORST

Image credits Catwalking

Post Paris XX

A false encyclopaedic guide to the menswear collections, presenting:
Balenciaga Spring/Summer 2013

1. Agostino Arrivabene Luci-Fero, 1997-2007
2. American Gigolo 1980
3. Prada Spring Spring/Summer 2008

From Italian Americana to Prada's floral fantasy collection, from 80s power dressing to religious nostalgia. The established icons of kitsch and overdosage. Bless those foes.
/HORST

Post Paris XIX

A false encyclopaedic guide to the menswear collections, presenting:
Ann Demeulemeester Spring/Summer 2013

1. Hugh Hefner at the Playboy Mansion
2. Haider Ackermann by Inez van Lamsweerde & Vinoodh Matadin
3. Paolo Roversi for Interview Magazine June/July 2011

Apparently, Ann Demeulemeester was inspired by Hugh Hefner. Well presumably not. Still, there was a luxurious softcore feel reminiscent of the aesthetics of her bvba 32 companion Haider Ackermann and the poetic shine in the photographs of Paolo Roversi.
/HORST

Irruption

Ungaro Fall/Winter 2006

What happened at Ungaro in 2006? A foreshadowing of Raf Simons' all-leather Gestapo army for Jil Sander? Plus the Lanvin-specific neck scarf and an exquisit casting? I sense an Ann vibe, too.
/HORST