Dear Shaded viewers,
Germanier closed Paris Haute Couture Fashion Week with his debut Haute Couture show, Les Globuleuses. His SS25 collection presents a vivid narrative about releasing control and challenging the illusion of perfection. In his show notes, Germanier described a woman who epitomises perfection, bound by discipline and control. She is everything we often aspire to be: composed, and flawless, and her world is meticulously curated. But in one unforeseen moment, a pearl tears free and falls from her dress. She hears its delicate clink as it reaches the ground, and for once, she acts irrationally. She places the pearl between her lips and swallows it, and from there all begins to change.
The collection takes off from there, as Germanier imagines the pearl as a catalyst for a new alchemy in the body. It fizzes in her stomach, setting in motion a complete metamorphosis. Her veins begin to glisten, her skin takes on an iridescent glow. From the inside out, her body becomes a kaleidoscope of colour and her muscles let go of their rigid stances. Germanier runs wild with this image, allowing his signature techniques and materials to transcend all of fashion’s restrictions.
Dresses explode with energy as if blossoming at light speed. The body’s forms are forgotten, and instead, dresses are shaped with sculptural spirals and curving organic forms. Colours and textures are selected across the spectrum, without fear of excess or inhibition. Creative expression is channelled in its rawest, most passionate form like Pollock paint splatters or Willem de Kooning’s swirling lines. The garments themselves become living, breathing entities that shift and evolve with each step taken. At the climax of the show, the woman transcends what it means to be human. She becomes a pure vision of joy and beauty, a beam of radiating energy untethered by rules or norms.
As his first Haute Couture collection to show, Germanier allowed himself to be just as unrestrained as the woman in the story he tells. His vision is epitomised in her, as a manifesto against the toxic ideals of perfection and the idea that fashion has boundaries to adhere to. The collection is a call for a new era in fashion, one that celebrates growth, irrationality and entirely new identities.
Later,
Eliya