un moment avec Lee
Paris, France
In true Devastée fashion, design duo Ophélie Klère and François Alary presented another ironically ghoulish collection of shirtdresses and silk shifts printed with their hand drawn icons of cemetery landscapes and other eerie things. A funerary procession played on the organ set the mood, before a more upbeat melody carried through. Much like the headstones and phantoms that decorate their garments are ironically stamped with a smiley face. A kind of mascot, the sort of awkward curve of its smile has a huge amount of personality in the context of the Devastée artwork.
Intarsia, white on black, knit dresses translates the drawings into graphic motifs. One with a hand drawn outline of a ghost, of course smiling ghoulishly, and another with an array of crosses and skulls, like looking through a macabre kaleidoscope. The buttons were big and decorative, white or designed with a black and white motif from their sketches. On top of the slouchy, silk and knit silhouettes, a stiff layer of transparent screening was like a bubble over the body, folding around the shoulders. Experimenting further with volume, the show closed with two full, layered dresses, the last of which, perhaps because of the joker-style smile smeared on the models faces, called to mind the ruffled collars and fullness of clown suits. But done in the Devastee way, this was a chic, if not devious looking clown. As the final run of show walked out to applause, you realize that in the end their little smiling mascot might be more like us than we think. The dark world of Klère and Alary always leaves you with images of cemeteries and skulls, but when you think of it you can’t help but smile.
- Lee Anderson, Parisian Correspondent
Designer website: devastee.free.fr
What we’ve said: Spring 2012
