Just when everyone was at the end of their tether, exhausted and slightly frazzled from a month of shows and perhaps slightly disillusioned by the contents of them, Miuccia Prada came along on the last day of Paris Fashion Week and put on a Miu Miu show that reflected the audience, just as much as it did the universal denominators of womanhood. You see, for some of us who had slightly given up on blowing out our hair on that last day, had spent the morning stuffing our suitcases and lining up our travel-essentials to board the Eurostar, keys on hand to get us back home — the show felt like vindication. Sometimes, the rigmarole act of dressing up can feel exhausting, especially under the glare of fashion week lighting and the phalanx of street style photographers. Sometimes, our hair is out of place, our clothes are slightly unbuttoned, and, yes, even people who get dressed for a living can sometimes look a mess. The Miu Miu show seemed to suggest that it’s okay, that not everything has to be influencer-perfect. Being a woman is hard — and whoever came up with that line about multitasking was a liar. Just when we needed to hear it, it seemed to say that there is an elegance to looking slightly askew and frazzled.
This was a collection of character studies, of Mrs Prada’s delicious tension between button-up primness and the anti-glamour of real-life womanhood. Mia Goth opened the show in a grey cardie, tights pulled over it, a low-slung chiffon skirt thrown on top, her slick ponytail with a static rustle of frizz, and shiny little kitten heels and a handbag campily balancing on the crook of her arm. It set the tone for a collection of brilliant characters studies that encapsulated the multitudes of being a woman, of thinking about women, with plenty of humour: mothers on the school run in their early-morning mismatched outfits; geek-chic students on their way to the library, spectacles on and bags stuffed full of books; retro secretaries slightly dishevelled after a steamy cinq-a-sept; girls on their way to a pilates class in hoodies, leggings and New Balance sneakers. The things women get done in a day!
There were silly little kitten heels to put a spring in their step and buckled brown brogues to ground them. There were office-appropriate tights pulled far too high, as though in a rush, as well as crystal-laden panties and Edie Sedgwick leotards. Polka-dot chiffon dresses, Modish tweed dresses and leather A-line tunics seemed to tap into the paradoxes of womanhood in the swinging sixties. And most of all, there were great pieces of outerwear, so much of which was artfully layered and exaggerated in shape to become caricatures of archetypes. This was a full wardrobe — with the noticeable exception of trousers, except for the boys in the show — for the generation of Miu Miu obsessives who came for the shrunken micro-skirts and will stay for the midi-length shrunken cardies, giant hoodies, and midi-length tweed skirts. There were also treats for diehard Miuccia fangirls, like the quintessentially Mrs P palette: a spectrum of classic sciura neutrals; slightly ‘off’ retro Formica hues; pretty Marchesi pastels; and deliciously acrid, zingy brights.
You get the sense that Miu Miu— the younger, more playful sister to Prada — is where Miuccia Prada can really have some fun. At Prada, her collections are serious; a reflection of serious things, like politics, and how clothes can communicate her feelings about the world. Her AW23 collection, co-designed with Raf Simons, was about celebrating the uniforms of everyday workers like nurses, builders, and teachers; she described it as “absolutely political” after the show in Milan. By contrast, Miu Miu seems to offer her some light relief from the woes of the world. Miuccia said that the latest collection came from a personal point of view, not just hers but the very idea of observing and absorbing what is around us.
“I am always interested in how people look at things, their consideration, why people are attracted to certain ideas, why others repulse them,” she explained. “This collection explores the idea of looking; the concept that, through close study, garments can be transformed both in their design, and again in how they are worn; how fashion and fashion design can change perceptions, of things we think we know.”
In other words, it was a brilliant exploration of things that have been right under our noses: athleisure, underwear, grey hoodies, our house keys, black tights, and perhaps even a thrifted tea dress that’s been waiting for sunnier days. “I have always been driven by the idea of understanding how women deal with the interaction between vanity and thought,” she added. “[This is] an invitation to reconsider.” It was also a reminder that Miuccia Prada is one of the wittiest designers around. The hair was the result of Guido Palau staticising models’ hair with balloons, which added to the slightly hurried, frazzled look of a woman who has pulled her sheer tights over a top, left the house clutching her keys, thrown on a giant hoodie, slung a handbag over the crook of her arm, and perhaps been in such a rush that she even forgot her trousers. We’ve all been there. Probably even Miuccia herself. This was reality, a word used far too often in fashion, at its most imaginative and inspiring.
Credits
Images courtesy of Spotlight