Demna's outfit suggests that she can go all out in a tank top as much as she can in a ball gown. (Charbit tells me, “Demna put creativity, innovation, and effort into things that people said, like, “Oh, we need this for sales.”) But he also respected the T-shirt limit. It could extend to the labor force. Couture show ends with wedding dress Demna says she's trying to do something smart She ended up replicating her 1967 oval gown;
Demna was never interested, echoing Duchamp, in the production of what he calls retinal fashion, that is, clothing that simply pleases the eye. Critics called the design simply ugly. Even some of his followers. “Every season I usually think about one or two things. “Okay, this is going too far. It’s really cool,” laughs artist and model Eliza Douglas. “Then, a few days later, I realized that I said I was like, ‘Oh my God, here’s the thing. She recently did this process with a varnished handkerchief.
Wellington boots and a high-collared, horn-shouldered posture were the result of Francis Bacon's extreme observation that beauty arises from proportionate alienation. The love for muted colors, whimsical prints and artificial details is reminiscent of the stalls of village markets. “He has different references and he dares to use them,” critic Sophie Fontanel said. "I'm sure there's something refined, elegant about it that could be considered some kind of gimmick ." ( Plow means something like "town".) What people call ugliness is often tension; physically comfortable things that cause aesthetic discomfort; technically dirty linen with external defects. “There were dresses that we literally tortured,” Demna says of the delicate black lace dress that took her team three days to make. Back on the fashion front, she applies sadism to clothes rather than accepting them.
The goal, of course, is to get people to talk. “If it doesn’t cause any reaction, then it doesn’t exist,” Demna once told me. "That's probably my biggest fear." According to a 2021 article published by an academic at the University of Lisbon, Demna is "the man who made memes trendy." A prime example of this are its compact bags: a Hefti-style calfskin trash bag, an IKEA- style leather cup holder that looks like a Lay's potato chip bag, and a $1,500 bag that comes in four styles (classic, lemon ), salt and vinegar. ) and Flamin' Hot). Analytics firm Launchmetrics found that a Hefty-ish bag generated $2 million in "media shock value" in one week.
This is true? Throughout Demna's career, observers tried to guess whether he was a genius eccentric or a real cynic. Artist and critic Hito Steyerl compared Balenciaga's hype machine to the Trump and Brexit campaign, promoting the product using "shock and normalization dynamics". Demna adapts well to the attention economy. A digital native, she understands the value of creating conversation. It doesn't always have to be positive. The ability to stir up a crowd makes it a little hard to believe that the gift shop's visual vibe was not a deliberate choice, even if the intent was to draw attention rather than harm.
People often worry that Demna is making fun of them. Douglas tells me. "I realized over time that he was caught up in the ambiguity and that he was walking that line and we didn't really know that." Demna wrote, "The beauty of some questions is that they don't always have answers." But he is acutely aware of what is behind his most outrageous actions. He tells me that he designs IKEA bags in the Duchamp tradition, flipping cultural hierarchies. This is a reference to the top of Margiela's 1990 Franprix bag. It is loosely based on Demna's personal history, reminiscent of the four years of fashion school she spent carrying her purse in her bag. She also makes bags in yellow, a color scheme that can only be obtained by stealing from an IKEA store. “I never considered irony negative,” says Demna. “Instead of being offended, you can laugh and say that this is funny. "
However, he was ambivalent about his ubiquitous creations. Three S's on the shoes. "I can't see anymore, you're tired of it!" Quick socks. "It makes me sad." Once in Paris, he took out his phone and mentioned that he had been in a group chat with several superfans who had given him honest feedback on his work. One of them is a public relations student from England. Others live in the United States doing everything. They never met in real life, but according to Demna, "they probably know more about my world than anyone else." One of them had just informed her about a fitted mini dress with an allover Balenciaga logo.
"He said, 'Did you really do it or did the commercial team do it for you?' "
"What will you answer?" I'm asking
"I said yes, but obviously that wasn't what I was made for and I felt like I had to do it ."
In 2021, Demna agreed to accompany Kim Kardashian to the Met Gala fashion party. She was worried about walking down the red carpet and exchanging pleasantries with a bunch of celebrities she'd never met. Dress code: American Independence. Demna and Kardashian appeared in all-black ensembles, their faces were hidden by opaque black masks. The only thing missing is the Grim Reaper's scythe.
"I'm afraid," Demna said. "So this is my decision, obviously there was a conceptual shift given the people I work with." Until recently, he insisted on shooting with the polyurethane oval body he developed with Mercedes-Benz engineers (I tried it on in the brand's showroom on George V Avenue. It's crystal clear. I feel invincible. I would wear it if (I wish I had five. One hundred and six hundred dollars for a face shield and another life.) He said he covered his face because he had problems with his body, especially after he saw a photo of himself taken at a conference: “with a triple chin.” that wearing more masks would probably make people look.” “Yes, in the end, yes,” he agreed. “Sometimes I feel like I subconsciously seek that attention.” He chuckled a little "Oh my god, this is weird. It's something I often discuss with my therapist.
“I think there is nothing to lose,” says Demna, sitting at his usual desk in the Kronenhalle, where wood paneling by Matisse and Miros Zurich hangs on the walls. He ordered veggie chicken and rosti. To drink: a small pitcher of lemon juice. He was mobile , silver balls were ringing in his ears. I asked him if the advertising scandal could usher in a new era of wasted nerves and earthly creativity. "I'm back on fashion boulevard," he says, throwing his arm over his shoulder to reveal a tattoo of his name. "But now my dilemma is finding a balance between dressing up but not too conservative or too classic."
It was a gray and foggy Monday in February. Before dinner we go for a walk. Demna chose Fraumünster as our meeting place, the copper garden church where she and Gomez got married in 2017. "Looks like Hogwarts, doesn't it? The couple spent the weekend filming a Netflix thriller called Alice in Borderland. They are ready to move to French villages near Geneva. Demna had just made an appointment to complete the paperwork and the official asked her why you were moving. “I didn’t speak Swiss German, so it was a little awkward,” he recalls. “Well, actually, it’s kind of a reaction. I said. "Yes, that's one of the reasons, because I don't understand what you're talking about." "
As we stroll through Zurich's shopping district, Demna's hooded cocoon and club-style kids' pants grab the attention of several people. (The feeling was mutual. "I thought the people in Zurich were very poorly dressed," he told me. "I don't know what it was. In fact, I was quite shocked.") This sketch, as I later realized ,… The classic Christopher peeks out from under the sweater with an elongated T-shirt that adds volume to the bottom layer of the babydoll dress.
At the Kronenhall, the plates looked familiar: white porcelain with a cobalt border and bright monograms. I remember drinking tea when I first met Demna, from a similar collection, only the cup said "Balenciaga Hotels & Resorts". (Of course, this does not happen.) A cup of tea then pissed me off a little. Is everything supposed to be a joke? I thought, should everything be a product? Now, in their old haunt, I see it as an expression of sincere affection.
Troll or honest, idealist or sarcastic? Demna has become everything and nothing, playing in the uncomfortable and fertile space of the accepted paradox. Now he declares that his "era of masks" is over. The result is memes, flashy shows, and all those “simple but fun” distractions that detract from the point. “I can make ten IKEA bags, but you can thrive without that comfort zone,” she told me. “What surprises my audience the most? I'm talking about people who know my work. Is it something provocative? Or am I really going to go back to my roots and make a cape you won't want to take off?"
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