Reinventing an iconic brand in an already saturated luxury market is not a venture to be entered into lightly, even if the label in question is regularly spotted on the backs of Hollywood’s glitterati and comprises dresses that offer more “lift’n’tuck” than a pair of Spandex knickers could ever dream of.
It is a challenge that Max Azria, the designer and CEO of BCBGMAXAZRIAGROUP mounted yesterday when he re-launched the Herv? Leger label to kick off New York fashion week.
Not since the mid-Nineties have dresses made famous by the “King of Cling” been shown on the catwalk. Acquired by Azria’s company in 1998, the timing was certainly right — the era of body consciousness is at its zenith, with British designers Christopher Kane and Marios Schwab championing clothing that tightly hugs the body.
If truth be told, however, an Herv? Leger dress would make most women look like a stuffed sausage roll, albeit an expensive one. Also, what was popular in the late Eighties and early Nineties can look a little ageing if worn with the same big hair and gaudy jewellery that we’ve now moved on from. And how would mummifying dresses bear relevance in six months when the fickle world of fashion decrees that — Heaven help us — baggy smock tops are making another comeback?
Azria did show promise with his woollen dresses that, using bandages as a motif, created waisted shifts with a gentle tulip skirt that was infinitely more forgiving. Ditto his experiment with a cappuccino chunky knit with bracelet sleeves and belted waist. Not so inspiring were endless dresses varying only slightly with different blocks of colour.
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Not that this probably matters. The financial might of Azria’s group — he owns his equally upscale eponymous line, the BCBG younger range and partnered with Carrefour recently in a deal estimated at $1 billion (£51 million) — is such that it would happily swallow such minutiae, and the acquisition of the Leger brand adds kudos.
He is also supported by a legion of uptown socialites. The Leger dresses are status symbols that imply the wearer can afford the personal trainer, and if things go really wrong, the lipo-suction too.
The refining influence of showing at New York fashion week is well documented: labels with an aesthetic that veers towards a messy, hippy-deluxe chic or pile-it-all-on exuberance usually find that they have to repackage themselves slightly to appeal to a slicker, commercial and more coiffed front row.
But even then, Saturday’s Sass & Bide show was still an uncharacteristically sombre collection, which proved to be a good thing. Hair was twisted into elegantly loose French chignons with just the odd peep of striped, sequin headpieces. A monochromatic palette in a silhouette of baggy top and a slim-fit bottom half combo ruled the evening with just the odd pop of colour via the playschool-spotted tunics or else harlequin, diamond prints. And what of the Elizabethan ruffs dangling from jacket shoulders, or the taxidermic black mice that were sewn on to hats?
Granted, you probably won’t find these on the third floor of Harvey Nichols, but a show has to contain a little bit of drama.