Again the female body and fashion’s obsessions with it triggered Rei Kawakubo to create her fall winter collection for Comme des Garcons. And again, like in her spring 1997 collection, she aded bulk and heft to all the places fashion avoids if it seeks to flatter and make sexy.
Humps and bumps were placed on shoulders, hips, backs and bodices. Kawakubo used pillowform outcrops of padding which she added to the clothes – coats, jackets, pants, skirts, dresses – and therefor completely changed the silhouette. This was a show that discussed the rules of beauty, ‘Inside Decoration’ was the description the designer gave in her press release. It’s probably the beauty within that makes her ugly clothes shine and elegant.
But you’ll never know with Kawakubo, the only thing you know for sure is that she keeps on tickling you and you fashion-expectations over and over again.