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Dries Van Noten retired from the runway after putting on his last show at the men’s collections in June, a moving swansong attended by throngs of his designer peers and scores of journalists, many of whom became customers over the years. Despite the never-ending game of designer musical chairs, Van Noten’s exit hits different. The big houses changing hands were launched decades ago (in Chanel’s case, over a century ago); new creative directors come in with a mandate to refresh legacies, not to replace a living founder. With that hard-to-fill job at DVN still open, this collection was the work of the label’s design studio. And so as the models made their way around the runway the thoughts running through minds were: What’s changed?
In brief, this was more familiar than it was different. Van Noten’s lush colors, pattern mixes, and embroidery work were all in evidence, “converging,” as the show notes expressed, “along an optimistic path, extending from the earliest women’s collections through what lies ahead.”
A bit of online sleuthing revealed that the fall ’97 show in particular was a touchstone, with its jewel tones, flower mixes, and blending of eastern and western codes of dress. Reissues have become standard issue in fashion recently, a reliable way to tap into our collective nostalgia and young people’s curiosity about the fashions of their parents’ generation. So fair enough for the DVN team to go the archive route, especially for lifting from this foundational collection, which came just three years after Van Noten launched his women’s line.
Where it seemed to diverge from known and loved Van Noten collections was in its reliance on lingerie touches: a marigold lace bandeau under a khaki blouson jacket; the silky tap pants that accompanied a pinstripe blazer; a fuchsia jacquard coat; and an embroidered evening jacket. But hooking a new gen on Dries Van Noten is part of the remit now, no doubt, and so Dries lovers will have to get accustomed to change. There’s surely more to come at this house, even if Van Noten remains a presence, as he did today, seated inconspicuously near the backstage entrance, but there all the same.
I was seated near the most committed of Van Noten fans, a woman whose closet is full of his clothes collected over the course of many years, and the look that got her camera phone clicking—a roomy floral jacquard knit vest over a chartreuse button-down and crinkly silver-blue cropped pants—had his trademark shouldn’t-work-but-it-does mix. I happen to have a fair bit of the designer’s pieces in my closet too, and the standout look for me involved his classic but relaxed tailoring, in the form of a pinstriped blazer tucked into paper-bag waist pants—still very Dries.
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