BEAUTY: Clothing--Yohji Yamamoto

I always love seeing a Yohji Yamamoto collection...the highly regarded and highly decorated designer is one of those elevated, iconic artists who are singular. While I love when a designer takes inspiration, or inspirationS from some wild, fascinating, interesting source, Yamamoto exists in a realm of his own mythology, much like Rick Owens. Yamamoto has his own vernacular and his own internal logic. His creations--East and West elements combined into a future/retro (sometimes ecclesiastical) sensibility, layered and slouchy Bohemian chic garments, flowing asymmetrical cuts, all awash with an insouciant, rippling sense of Romanticism worthy of any French Symbolist poet--are timeless, since they are not necessarily tethered to anything outside of their orbit.

But for his Fall-Winter '23-'24 collection just shown at Paris Fashion Week, he was thinking of the Asian influences that came along the Silk Routes into ancient and medieval Europe and how those cultures collided and blended. What really stands out is that Yamamoto, known as the King of Black for his penchant for working mostly in an inky color palette, used appropriately printed (a double ikat!) and richly colored fabrics like Japanese silk, velvet, and thick brocade, layered one on top of the other. I almost felt like I was watching a Dries Van Noten collection from years past. Just look at all those luscious, regal fabrics and patterns all piled together (click to see looks number 4 and number 6). The resulting mix is stunning, and especially so in Yamamoto's typical Romantic silhouettes which this time around also included tight jackets with several rib-wrapping belt closures. Glorious...

https://www.yohjiyamamoto.co.jp/en/