As more than a thousand people traversed the rush hour–choked West Side Highway and flooded onto Pier 26—all dressed to the nines (or maybe the threes or twos, given the skimpiness of a few notable looks)—it’s fair to say that one of the very last things they were expecting was to be immersed in a contemplative experience. Yet this is what they got from Riccardo Tisci on the night he brought his Givenchy show to New York City, coinciding with the 14th anniversary of 9/11. There was no all-out gig from Rihanna and Kanye West (as had been the speculation when “performances” were mentioned), and no inaugural walk from Caitlyn Jenner, which had been optimistically rumored, given Tisci’s strong credentials as fashion’s first champion of transgender models.
Instead, with the aid of his coconspirator, the artist Marina Abramovic, and the cooperation of a staggering sunset across the Hudson, Tisci made his show into a meditation on the losses of 9/11, and on slowing things down in our heads, perhaps to mourn, but also to remember how lucky we are to be alive. The audience—the seated professionals and celebrities, and the standing public—were made to wait and watch for a good hour, absorbing the spectacle of blue sky and white and pink-tinted clouds as Abramovic’s slow-moving performers, dressed in white shirts and black pants, acted out simple, strenuous, and repetitive rituals—one with a ladder, another with a tree, a third with a faucet gushing water. Stop! Abramovic seemed to be saying. Slow down and feel something! And meanwhile, in the foreground, the nonstop parade of personalities kept coming, and kept on being photographed and Instagrammed.
As far as style is concerned, this was also Tisci’s opportunity to revisit and refine the ideas he’s been working through for his whole career. This year—in which a Givenchy store opens in New York City—is Riccardo Tisci’s tenth at the house, and there was a serene sense of celebration and coming of age amongst the clothes. It was a collection which spelled out and repeated almost-calligraphic black and white variations of the same sentences: Ivory slip dresses and rouleau-strapped camisoles with lace edges, worn over excellently tailored black pants cut to taper gently over pointed shoes. Supple crepe tuxedo jackets with tails, soft kimono coats, and transparent organdy trenches glimmering with jet embroidery. Many, many body-skimming sparkly silver shifts.
Aficionados of Tisci’s track record in Paris would also have re-applauded the most spectacular of his couture dresses—one with a degrade feather effect, and another with leather patches applied on tulle in the shape of alligator skin—which had never before been shown on live models (as opposed to showroom dummies). And then there was the face decoration, taken to the nth degree of freakishly beautiful elaboration, in studded golden jewelry, tulle frills, and lace.
That calm exposition of skill and taste, which surely grows out of nineties memories, will stay in the minds of everyone who was on Pier 26 tonight. The tragedy of 9/11 can never be overwritten by any fashion show—and nor should it be—but at the same time, anyone who condemns fashion for concerning itself with current feelings is wrong, too.
