Givenchy Catwalk Fashion Show Paris Womenswear FW2014

Riccardo Tisci redefined the word Womanly with his fall collection, amplifying the sensuality and subverting the traditional while layering on fantasy, modernity and luxury. The collection was about celebrating femininity and the rock woman.
Tisci created a tension between rich romance and powerful tailoring, opening with the former on buttoned-up silk blouses and skirts with soft pleats and tucks. Increasingly dreamy incarnations of that silhouette came in a leopard-print dress with butterfly wing motifs on the bust, and a butterfly print blouse with a ruffle in the outline of a heart on the chest.

As an aggressive contrast to the flou, many of the soft blouses had stark, linear strips across the shoulder blades. Similar strips and panels recurred throughout the show, adding strokes of color and geometry to his riffs on knit twinsets and tailoring cut with a Forties masculine allure.

The palette deepened and brightened throughout the show on abstract butterfly and snake motifs, leathers and opulent furs. The show culminated on a darkly seductive note: lean gowns with fitted shell-like tops and black pleated skirts.