It was about inflation
Inflation! It’s coming. Whether you’re watching CNN in your Milan hotel room or passing a newspaper bulletin on your way to a show, these days it’s impossible not to feel like you’re waiting for some looming apocalypse to unfold. And yet, life seems to go on. “With the news cycle being so strong and dramatic as we’re all experiencing, and everyone talking about inflation, I thought, how do I bring inflation to the runway?” Jeremy Scott said backstage before his Moschino show, which did just that. Over the course of some 60 looks, he imbued his ladylike silhouettes with inflatable elements from lapels and pockets to adornment, and the construction of garments itself, creating that rarest of fashion moments: a collection that made you laugh for the right reasons.
Scott wore his heart on his sleeve
Set in a vast show space on the outskirts of Milan where Scott had erected a mock-chic elevated runway with a palatial fountain in the middle, the show opened with takes on Franco Moschino’s heart interpreted in inflatable form – nozzles and all – and embellished onto little shoulder-padded skirt and trouser suits, and dresses. “She’s literally wearing her heart on her sleeve,” Scott said. “Obviously, we need love more than ever.” The hearts soon integrated with the clothes, inflating the necklines and hemlines of dresses and blowing up the lapels of blazers, until the theme progressed into a darker and more poignant sense of humour: question marks, the very symbol of our anxious news-driven mentality. “You know…” Scott shrugged.
It threw us a life raft
The question marks served as a fanfare to the more serious inflatable elements. “With all the negativity in the news cycle – there’s also the war on women going on globally, the Queen’s passing – we’re in a deluge of it,” Scott reflected. “We’re drowning in it. So, to not drown there’s a life raft and life preserver to save you.” Adapting the stripes of beach chairs, elements of swimwear, and little summer suits, he turned his emergency inflatables into hats, belts, bustiers, and a new take on Moschino’s life preserver jacket. In times that feel like rough seas, these were clothes to keep you afloat. “It’s survival,” as Scott put it.
It turned into a pool party
If there was a certain tragicomedy to the collection, Scott imbued the final section of the show with the determined optimism that drives his work. “You have to save space for joy. To get through all of this, how can we go back and fight the good fight – the battles that are important?” he said. “For the finale I wanted a full explosion of colour, passion, playfulness, and joy.” And so, Moschino’s hearts, question marks and life rafts transitioned into another category of inflatables: pool party floaties, inflatable animals and the cartoonish sea of colour those ideas evoke. It crescendoed into blown-up ballroom silhouettes in couture-like shapes fashioned from animal floaties.
It’s all about the inflatable accessory
Even Scott’s accessories were adapted from inflatables: flamingo floaty stilettos, pumped-up bucket hats, pool ball bags, and life raft hats. As the show notes poeticised: “Ultimately, though, it’s about offsetting the negativity – of breaking through the surface into a ray of sunshine, even when the rest of the water is shadowed in grey. That’s where joy may be found.”
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